


Phantasm

by fineinthemorning



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Angst, Body Horror, Character Death, Cutting, Dark, Dreams and Nightmares, Dreamsharing, Drug Addiction, Hallucinations, Hallucinogens, Horror, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Maybe Sprout Wings, Non-Consensual Drug Use, One Shot Collection, Psychosis, Purgatory, Self-Mutilation, Sexual Content, Slavery, Slice of Life, Suicide, Tragedy, Trypophobia, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-22
Updated: 2018-05-06
Packaged: 2019-03-08 02:09:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 15
Words: 62,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13448307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fineinthemorning/pseuds/fineinthemorning
Summary: Trapped in a cycle of nightmares, they live new lives and fall prey to new tragedies that only serve to strengthen their bonds.~A Collection of Interconnected One-Shots and AUs~





	1. Train

**Author's Note:**

> I'm just trying to get into the habit of making time to write every day. Sometimes, I don't have the energy to work on my multi-chapter fics, so I just write the first thing the comes to mind. Assuming I'm always thinking about these two (OTL), I'll end up with a number of one-shots before long.  
> The one-shots are connected.  
>  ~~I used to write for Tokyo Ghoul, so my affinity for horror, tragedy, and all things gruesome is coming out quite a bit in this fic. Brace yourself.~~

"And here we are again."

Akira didn't look up; he didn't have to. Despite it being so long since he'd heard the voice outside of a dreamscape, he recognized it instantly. He'd never forget it; he couldn't. After all, he was the only person who was keeping Akechi Goro alive. The moment he forgot that voice was the moment that Akechi Goro ceased to exist.

"You should just let go already," it called out, sounding farther away now.

Akira recognized the train and stared at the floor a moment before his eyes traveled to take in his surroundings. The white handles and the dark blue seats were clean, spotless and seemingly untouched. The advertisements were blank but the TV screens were playing the same video feed over and over in a loop. On the small screen was a moment Akira never wanted to let go of, a moment so simple and inconsequential that he would never live to experience again. Outside the windows, the dark concrete that passed around them never let up. The Yamanote never went underground, however, and yet, that's where it was traveling now. The setting was always off when he met with Akechi just as it had been in the times they'd met before his death. Akechi had always made him feel like there was something new he hadn't noticed before when he was around and, in turn, always made him feel like he was missing something in his absence. Even here, it wasn't any different.

When Akira finally turned to look to Akechi, he noticed he was sitting with his head down some distance away in the last seat, bright orange handles swinging above his head as the train moved through the tunnel it never belonged in.

Akira stood up, his balance easily found as he walked through the otherwise empty train car. He stopped in front of Akechi, who was dressed in his detective coat, and he loosely gripped one of the orange handles above as he leaned in, "Apparently we haven't repeated this enough. You're still asking me to give up."

Akechi looked up, red eyes searching Akira's gray ones.

Akira didn't show on his face how much it hurt to see the hole in the other's head, dripping red blood down his face, on either side of his nose, around his lips, and down his chin. He was almost certain Akechi didn't have to appear to him this way. He was completely certain that Akechi didn't have to make all of this more difficult than it needed to be. If only Akechi, for once, would allow this to be a dream rather than a nightmare.

"There's no place for me there; the world has forgotten me." Akechi's expression was blank, neither feigned nor forced. Akira knew he wasn't speaking out of an attempt to gain pity. It was clear that it was just a fact to him--a fact that was unchangeable and a fact that Akira needed to be reminded of.

"I haven't."

Akechi put his head down again, and instead of being patient, Akira knelt down on the still-moving train that refused to stop at every station.

The bullet wound was gone and the trail of blood had disappeared. With Goro's red eyes closed, Akira suspected his next action wouldn't come as a surprise. He leaned in, reaching, and pressed his lips to the other's, his kiss gentle but insistent.

Akechi didn't move to accept or deny, and, after another awkward moment of tongue on closed teeth, Akira pulled away, sighed, and took the seat on Goro's right.

"I'm dead," Akechi whispered. He leaned back suddenly, a small smile on his face as the back of his head hit the glass behind him and his hair fell away from his closed eyes.

"Here, you're alive." Akira watched him open his eyes to look at him with annoyance written in the line of his lips and narrowing of his eyes.

When Akira said nothing else, Akechi closed his eyes again, "You can't spend your life in a dream."

"I don't mind if it's with you," Akira replied instantly, still watching him.

Goro opened his eyes, red searching gray, "Akira would never say something like that."

It made him laugh, open and honest. This was not the first time Goro had said something like this--as if this were _his_ dream and not Akira's. He let his head fall against Goro's shoulder, and, with neither permission nor warning, he took Akechi's left hand in his right and leaned in closer until he was comfortably resting against him. "You're my most selfish wish." Really, he was his only selfish wish . . . the only thing in his life he'd ever truly wanted just for himself. He didn't want Akechi so that Akechi could be helped or saved. He wanted, instead, to help Akechi so that he would, in return, save him.

"I'm your sin," Akechi corrected him.

Akira buried his face deeper into his neck shamelessly. It was a dream; there was no need to regret actions here and there was no need to be careful. " . . . for having never saved you."

He felt Goro stiffen, "Tch. No."

Akira wondered if they'd always see things differently. Even now, with him being transparent in the nightmare they shared, he still felt as though Akechi didn't understand his persistence, his words, or his intentions.

"I'm going to bring you back." He'd never spelled it out so clearly before. Surely, it would be enough.

"That's not possible. I have no body-"

"I'll find it," Akira interrupted.

Akechi sounded tired, his annoyance giving way to exhaustion, "Shido's palace was destroyed, wasn't it? You Phantom Thieves-"

"You exist."

Akechi crossed his legs. He uncrossed them. He crossed his arms. He crossed his legs again. He finally responded. "What does it matter if I do?"

"It means I have a reason to," Akira replied simply as if he'd been waiting to say it all along.

"You're not making any sense," Akechi snapped, completely taken aback by Akira's words as if they'd carried an insult rather than some weighty compliment.

"I know, but--" Akira sat up again, pulling Akechi suddenly closer to him, turning his head by the chin to look at him, "even still, you trust me."

Akechi went silent, his expression empty as he gently moved the other's hands away to free himself. Akira knew it was true; Akechi had proven with his last words before he'd died. He'd trusted him to take care of his father, to bring down Shido, to do what Akechi had suffered for all of those years.

And he did.

"I do," Akechi whispered, his voice bitter.

"Akechi Goro, I'm going to bring you back from the dead."

Akechi didn't look at him, but instead, stared at the video over the door that played on a loop. Akira followed his line of sight and he smiled at the image that played on repeat while Akechi stared up in empty horror. 

Akechi, at Leblanc, a smile on his face as he lifted a cup of coffee, smiled again, and again, and again, as the video continued to loop soundlessly. 

Akira would never forget. And Akechi? He would never be free.  


	2. Wall

An endless expanse of hollow space spread in all directions around him. He squinted his eyes to see further, hoping that, if he focused hard enough, he may see or even hear something that would lead him somewhere.

Still nothing.

He turned around, standing still on a spotless white floor, to stare out into the empty space before him.

There. A black spec.

He shook his head, knowing all too well what it was, and headed in the direction of the single clue he had. The absence of color led him straight to the only person that once colored his world. He kept walking until, quite literally, he hit a transparent wall, that, upon stepping back, had only the faintest reflection to signal to him its presence.

Glass, clear and tall rising to a ceiling unseen, separated them.

Touching it gently with a gloved hand, Goro knocked on the surface of the wall in hopes it would stir the other awake.

It didn't.

"Kurusu?"

Nothing.

"Akira!"

Nothing still.

Akechi sat down in front of the wall, watching as the other slept. He pulled his knees against his chest and observed as the other's chest gave a subtle rise and fall. He counted the seconds. Inhale. One. Two. Exhale. One. Two.

In this world, there was nothing but himself, Akira, and the wall. As he watched the other sleep, he debated the meaning. Akira always spoke as if these dreams were his. Goro was convinced otherwise. He hadn't expected Kurusu to be so incredibly egocentric, but, well, since they had begun to share these spaces outside of reality, he realized there were a number of things he'd never realized about Kurusu Akira. Back then, when he'd been alive and blinded by his own selfish ambitions, he'd been surprised by the leader of the Phantom Thieves so many times--not just as a Persona user, but even just as a person as well.

Goro sighed, his eyes still on the sleeping figure on the other side of the glass. Faintly, he could make out his own reflection as he watched Akira sleep on his side, Akira's mouth partly open as drool fell from the corner of his lips. Had he always looked so tired or had death aged him? He never felt hungry anymore. He was never tired, either. But, he did still feel pain. He laughed, but now only when he meant to. He breathed, too, which, for a dead person, must have counted for something. Maybe he was dead physically, but in his mind, he was still very much alive. What did it matter?

Goro inched closer to the glass. Even through his gloves, it felt cold, but the air around him did not. He didn't feel cold; only his fingers were as they lingered too long on the wall that separated him from the only stimulation this world had to offer.

"Wake up already. You're asleep, even in a dream?"

Akira's eyes opened suddenly, blinked several times, and rested there on Akechi's own.

Akechi didn't understand how he could see how long Akira's lashes were even a meter away and separated by glass. Goro watched as Akira slowly moved to sit up, his lips moving as he did though no sound came out.

No, that wasn't right. Even as Akira scooted closer to him across the floor to close the distance between them, there was no sound. Goro simply continued to watch and made no effort to speak back to him. Akira was many things, but unintelligent was not one of them; he would understand soon enough that Goro could not hear him.

Akira continued his efforts across the floor until, quite suddenly, his head hit the glass wall between them and he bounced back with a confused expression and a hand to his forehead.

Akechi couldn't help but laugh at the look on Akira's face. He'd completely missed it even at such a close range. At least Akechi had been moving forward at a pretty brisk pace before hitting the wall. Akira had only been lazily pulling himself across the floor. He practically deserved to be laughed at. When recovered, a now small smirk on Akechi's face, he realized that Akira's expression had changed. He was reaching out to the wall, touching it carefully and then pulling his hand away and shaking it at his wrist as if it had bitten him. Was it the cold or had it shocked him?

Goro watched his lips move again, his gray eyes serious as he spoke. Akechi had learned a great many things in his short life, but, surprisingly enough despite the usefulness of the skill, he had not learned how to read lips. That meant that as Akira continued to speak, Goro made no acknowledgment of understanding. He did not nod or shake his head. He made no attempt to speak, himself. He didn't even blink to show his recognition of Akira's distress. Having already come to accept their current setting for what it was while Akira lay asleep, he did not see the point in attempting to change the arrangement.

After all, wasn't it fitting?

Akira was on the other side of a glass wall Akechi could never scale or break through; Kurusu Akira, leader of the Phantom Thieves, was untouchable. He wasn't someone that Akechi could have ever actually gotten close to. They were never actually friends or rivals or anything as familiar as all of that. Even if Joker had seen him at his worse, he still did not know him. He still did not know who he was or what made him who he was. He did not know what he'd suffered. He never would.

Akechi shifted and ran a gloved hand through his hair as he watched Akira begin to pace. He guessed that the favored player was not fond of this design; he was not content to remain a world away from Akechi on the other side of a near-transparent glass. Rebellious even in dreams, apparently.

The former detective watched as Akira walked up to the glass, knocked twice with his wrist upturned, pulled his right hand back, and swung. Akechi stood up, stepping back suddenly. In the soundless space where he could only hear his own heartbeat, he registered the other's desperate attempts to break through as meaningless.

Until the glass cracked.

Eyes widening, Akechi watched as the leader of the Phantom Thieves swung wildly at the wall between them shaking his head from side to side without even realizing his own feeble attempts to stop the other's destruction.

Akira motioned for him to step back further and in a final attempt, Akira punched through the glass shattering a space in the wall between them for an instant before he was suddenly thrown back flying backward through the air and hitting the ground.

Akechi noticed he hadn't heard him fall before he noticed the shattered glass had been repaired anew. Though there were still pieces lying before him at his feet, the wall appeared unbroken.

"Kurusu!"

He ran to the wall, some larger pieces of glass crushed beneath his feet as he pounded against the glass.

"Akira! Are you alright?!"

When he didn't move, Akechi pounded against the glass again, trying to wake him, knowing very well the other couldn't hear him. He hadn't expected that. This was the first time, actually, that their shared dreams had been violent. Usually, they'd talk in some strange setting-- strange either in absurdity or normality. But this--

Akechi took a step back.

Akira had sat up.

No, he hadn't expected something like this at all. Where Akira's right hand had once been was nothing more than a stub, an arm bleeding fiercely with bone, muscle, and sinew spilling from the empty space that Akira's hand should have occupied. Akira looked down at it only once before rushing back over to him.

Akechi didn't understand. Didn't it hurt? Wasn't he scared? Even if it was a dream, even looking at it from here, on the other side of a now seemingly impenetrable glass, it was gruesome. Disgusting, even. By no means a clean cut, it looked more like something had eaten away at his arm in chunks until it had successfully ripped his hand clear off.

And that's when Akechi was left stunned.

The black-haired boy touched his left hand to the wound repeatedly and slowly, a few letters at a time, wrote backward on the glass in blood for Akechi to read.

 

**Are you okay?**

 

Akechi snapped, scowling at the boy who appeared genuinely more concerned about him than himself, despite his own condition.

"What do you mean, ' _am I okay_ '? I didn't just lose a hand." He hissed. Akira appeared to be processing his response, probably trying to guess the words he'd said. Akechi sighed, stared a moment at the broken glass on the ground, and simply nodded his head. When he finally looked up again, he saw a new message.

 

**I'm glad.**

 

Akechi crossed his arms and shook his head, doing his best to neutralize his expression. When had this happened? These . . . _feelings_ Akira seemed to have for him? Was it just his hero complex? Was he simply the one he couldn't save? Why were they even connected in this way? Why did they share dreams like this?

Akechi didn't speak, didn't even move, as Akira continued to write in his own blood, the red liquid still steadily dripping from the open wound. In his head, he was counting seconds. Akira would die in ten, maybe fifteen minutes with a wound like that. He'd bleed out and go unconscious first. Then, his brain would fail. He'd die on the other side of the glass wall and all Akechi would be able to do was watch--watch as he bled out from a wound he'd obtained only so that he could be closer to him.

It almost felt poetic in the right way, like such a tragedy was the stuff of the greats written in curling script on the backs of lovers.

But no, not quite. This was, instead, a tragedy written in a drunken haze by a man who'd lost everything. Poetic though it may be, there was no beauty in it.

 

**I'll never leave you alone.**

 

This place, this moment, this dream, was wrong.

"You're going to die!" Akechi yelled, allowing his anger to show.

Akira shook his head with a small smile, as if he understood, which Akechi was sure he hadn't, and continued to write, red floating between them and painting the space that separated them.

 

**I won't give up.**

 

"Idiot!" Akechi had stepped closer, following him further down the wall as he wrote. "Stop this. I don't need you."

Akira's eyes studied him, watched his lips, his tongue, his hands. He waited, a little river of blood trailing from the place they'd started a few meters away to where Akira was writing now, analyzing, scrutinizing what Akechi may or may not have said.

His right arm went up, and, instead of using the fingers of his left hand to write, he pressed the bloodied limb against the glass and wrote out in thick, large, red letters. Akechi watched on in horror at the first character, the next, and as he finished the sentence, Akechi felt bile rise up in his throat.

 

**I need you.**

 

Akechi dove suddenly for the broken glass on the floor. Not that one. That wouldn't work. Too small. Too dull. That one.

He lifted a sharp, long piece of glass in his left hand to his throat. He couldn't remain in this nightmare. It was too kind and too twisted in the same turn, like a happy marriage between love and chaos. They belonged on either sides of the wall--separate--always apart.

The last thing he could hear was the shattering of glass, falling like precious stones to a spotless floor, and his name, in a desperate plea from the one voice that remained with him even after death, just as he shut his eyes and cut once across his neck.

Maybe it didn't matter who the prisoner was. The point was, they'd always be in separate cells.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by 'Draw with Me'.


	3. Apartment

Akira woke up with a jolt, his eyes shooting open to see another person in his bed, sound asleep. A square set jaw. Hair the color of honeyed amber.

Akechi Goro.

He blinked, smiling to himself at his own foolishness. Of course, it was Goro. What was wrong with him? Who else would it have been?

They'd been together nearly three years now, both attending college at Tokyo U living in a tiny apartment a short train stop or a twenty-minute bike ride away from the university. Life had been so pleasantly normal that Akira had begun to take it for granted. He remembered what they'd had to overcome to get here now. After all, it was rare that he woke up before his boyfriend did. He'd take a moment to indulge in the beauty of what his life had come to be.

Shido. Mementos. They'd disbanded the Thieves but had remained together. His friends had remained his friends, but none of them approved of Akechi. None of them approved of him never going to jail for his crimes. None of them approved Akira protecting him. So, their relationships had never quite been the same.

Akira didn't care. Not really.

When he'd moved in with Akechi just under two years ago, Morgana hadn't even followed him, instead staying with Futaba and leaving Akira to reflect on the choice he'd made, hoping likely that he'd make a better one.

He never did.

This had been the best choice, anyway. Besides, Akechi had already had a change of heart. No, it hadn't been through some palace or metaverse or persona; he'd merely fallen in love. By some miracle, Akira had earned Akechi's trust enough that he'd allowed himself to share everything with him. Akira had learned why Akechi had done what he'd done; he'd learned what had been done to him, and, after the whole process, Akechi learned what he must do.

Akira didn't allow anyone else to punish him or tell him what he needed to atone for; Akechi was already on his path to redemption. He was studying now not to be an officer or a detective, but to be a social worker.

_'I became what I did because of what I experienced. Those experiences shaped me into someone with a twisted sense of justice and a faulty understanding of love. If I can help it, I'll devote the rest of my life to preventing that from happening again . . . to any child . . . I'd rather spend my life preventing these things than correcting them. You understand, don't you?'_

Akira had sworn to him that night more than a year ago. He'd sworn that he'd never let him stray, and he'd sworn that he'd never give up. Akechi's dream to become something better, something whole and honest, had become Akira's now as well. He was not going into social work, but law, and instead of specializing in criminal law as he'd once been interested in, he was now specializing in juvenile law instead. They would work together; he was sure. Together, they'd make sure no child would have to experience the same pain and abuse that Akechi had. In a way, Akira had once saved Japan. He figured that if they worked together, they could do twice as much even without the Metaverse.

Akechi's eyes blinked open a few times before he yawned and stared back at Akira.

"What are you looking at?"

Akira smiled; Goro was always so charming first thing in the morning. "My prince," he responded slyly.

Goro rolled his eyes and sat up, "What time is it? Don't we have class?"

No, Akira wasn't about to let Goro get out of bed so easily. "It's Sunday." Akira's bare arms reached up, pulled Akechi back down into bed, and then moved to pull the covers back over them.

Akechi smiled and pulled Akira closer to him, "And you woke up before me? I was supposed to bike this morning."

In response, Akira shifted in the bed until he was halfway on top of him.

When he didn't move, Goro sighed and put his arm around his waist, "This is your way of telling me I'm not going anywhere?"

Akira nodded, eyes closed, against Akechi's chest, his right leg between Goro's. If he bent his knee, then he could easily rub against him.

He watched Akechi close his eyes and let out a breathy sigh.

Akira turned his head into Goro's neck and his tongue slid from between his lips to apply pressure, thick and slow, against Akechi's neck before he began to suck on the same skin, taking some between his teeth until Akechi squirmed beneath him.

" _Akira--_ "

Akira pulled away, planting his left hand in the mattress to push himself up and look into Goro's red eyes, "Yes?" His right arm slid beneath the pillow Akechi’s head rested on.

"Sundays are--" Goro's words caught in his throat as Akira bent his knee against him. Blushing now, Akechi narrowed his eyes and grit his teeth, "the only days I get to bike for leisure. Get up."

Akira pressed into him again and then leaned down to press his lips to his, forcing the other's mouth open with his own lips aggressively until Goro relented and allowed for his tongue to slide in. Akira deepened the kiss, reaching his tongue further inside as he felt his boyfriend's hands on his hips, fingers slowly making their way beneath the fabric of his boxers.

He felt Goro’s hands grab at his ass and massage until Akira’s legs spread further without thought and his own length rubbed against the other’s right leg. His boyfriend’s fingertips then traced up his spine leisurely before scratching their way back down in red lines that left Akira gasping with pleasure, forced to break the kiss to hiss from the pain.

Goro smiled at him, and Akira was sure he could already feel him hard against his leg. For a moment, they studied each other, Akira already pink and wanting, his mouth hung open slightly as he tried to move his lips into a cocky smirk that only ended up looking more and more salacious by the second. Goro, on the other hand, was still able to look confident and nearly collected despite the pink in his cheeks and the increase in heart rate.

Akira would have to change that quickly. He leaned in again, the fingers of his left hand sliding into his lover’s hair. This time he paid more attention to his boyfriend’s neck, and within seconds, Akechi was moving beneath him, his breath rushed in his ear as he gasped with pleasure.

Their lips met again, and as they kissed, despite their boxers still being on, they grinded against one another, pressing desperately and creating friction enough that they were both hard and gasping seconds later.

Akira broke the kiss and began to trail wet kisses down Goro’s neck, nipping in just the right spots to make Goro gasp aloud in encouragement. His kisses continued further, and he moved back on the bed to make space to unceremoniously pull the other’s boxers off, freeing his lover’s erect cock.

Akechi smiled at him knowingly but sat up and dove hands into messy black hair as he kissed him before pulling Akira back on top of him. Akira moaned into the kiss, weak to the loss of control Akechi so frequently provided him when they were intimate. As the kiss continued, Akira’s right hand moved down to Akechi’s length and wrapped around him with familiarity, his thumb pressing against the head of his cock.

Goro’s hands were suddenly on his back and before Akira could stop him, nails scraped sharp and deep, and he cried out from the pain as he felt skin tear and blood puddle.

“Goro?” Akira’s hands moved immediately to push himself up, his legs still straddling him. His eyes were wide as he stared down at his boyfriend’s cold expression. “You’ve never--”

“Don’t speak.”

Akira froze. He could feel the blood from his wounds begin to trail warm rivulets down his back.

Akechi pulled his legs away and sat up in front of him, not a hint of shyness or even arousal aside from his still erect length. “I’m just some wet dream to you?”

Akira stared back at his face, not recognizing it. Why did he look so upset? What had happened? What was he talking about? Was this some kind of roleplay? Akira tried to piece together what was happening, his mind searching through the years of their relationship for a hint at what Goro was referring to but--

Wait. He couldn’t remember.

When was the last time they’d been intimate? No, when was the first? But, hadn’t it been so clear a moment ago? His gray eyes scanned Akechi’s dull rust-colored pupils for answers, but all that he found was disdain.

“Goro, I don’t understand.”

Akechi’s eyes narrowed and before Akira could react, he felt a hand around his throat that threw him back against the bed, pinning him down. “You tried to fuck me.”

Why couldn’t he remember their relationship? Not minutes ago, everything had been so clear, so perfect, and now--He couldn’t recall a single kiss--a single _touch_ \--not even a lover’s quarrel. Why couldn’t he _remember_?!

“You look like a cornered animal.” Akechi pressed harder with his left hand and his right dove into his hair to pull his head back as he straddled him, trapping him even further. “ _You’re disgusting._ ”

Akira’s mind raced, his eyes wild and desperate. He couldn’t speak. No, he couldn’t _breathe_! His hands grasped desperately at air, unable to see with his hair being pulled and his head along with it. All he could see was the opposite wall of their apartment.

No.

That was wrong.

He had no idea where he was.

Some stranger’s house?

He’d never been here before.

He’d never--

Tears burned at the corners of his eyes and he finally felt the pressure release. He gasped for air, coughing, and turned his head back up to look at Goro.

The disdain was gone, replaced instead by a silent despair-- an unspoken loneliness. Akechi wouldn’t meet his eyes, and he noticed that the former detective couldn’t even manage to look away from the empty space in the sheets.

“How do you know this is my dream?” Akira asked.

“Oh, so it’s only mine when it is convenient for you?” Akechi snapped, his voice not matching his expression as he still refused to look at him.

“The same could be said of you,” he answered back, reality settling in.

“It’s not my dream,” Akechi finally looked at him, cold and defiant.

“How do you know?” Akira asked.

Akechi moved off of him, stepped out of the bed and spoke only once before heading straight to the bedroom door.

“Because I don’t want this.”

With the door slammed shut, Akira touched his neck with his right hand, sat up, and touched his back with his left. Pulling his left hand back, he stared at the blood on his fingertips and winced at the new bruising on his neck.

Was it true that this is what Akira wanted or had Akechi lied?

He looked around the room, seeing nothing as familiar. A life together with Akechi was as foreign as his surroundings and, right now, felt just as painful.

There were no hopes for the dead.

If that were true, then it must have been his dream.

It must have been his.

Right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Riiiiiiight?


	4. Unfamiliar Ceiling 1

"Good morning," he heard a whisper call out, and he knew immediately it was directed to him though he couldn’t place why.

"He's awake?!" a girl asked, voice full of wonder and fascination. Innocent, like a child. He could hear her step closer.

"Not so loud, Ann!" another girl's voice that was, admittedly, equally loud, seemed to pull her back.

The first girl said softly, in a whisper that everyone could hear, "I can't help it. I'm excited."

"Shiho, could you--" the first voice insisted gently.

"Reading your mind. Let's go Ann-chan." Said the second girl, now sounding a touch more mature.

"Bye, Ren-kun! Call us when he's recovered!"

"Will do," replied the male voice--deeper, much older, certainly with more years and more authority than the children. A door slammed shut.

He blinked, attempted to open his eyes, but shut them abruptly closed every time they caught the light. It stung, like pouring salt on a wound, and every time he tried to make out a new shape in the room, the sun blinded him. He learned, quite quickly, that it was better not to open them at all. He wasn't sure where he was or what he was doing there, but it didn't bother him so much that he'd continue subjecting himself to the pain.

It was better not to see.

"It's okay. I'll shut the window and the curtains," the voice said gently after likely having noticed his struggle.

He didn't say anything but waited for the sound that would tell him that it was safe to open his eyes. He felt lethargic; his body was weighed down and sore as if he'd never used his muscles before, or possibly, that he'd strained them all at once, and it made moving them now, as they attempted to recover, incredibly difficult. And there was a pain--one he knew _shouldn't_ be there, on his back near his shoulder blades. Something beneath his skin was fighting to get out, and it only made his body feel even heavier. What was it there, moving beneath his skin? The little girl had mentioned that he had to recover. Recover from what? He was lying now on his stomach, so he attempted to sit up only to fall back instantly into the same position.

It was better not to move.

" _Where am I_?"

His mouth was dry enough that even the back of his throat felt like it was aching for water. His voice didn't even sound like his own--like he was hearing it for the first time and he had yet to become acquainted with it. No, he couldn't even recall what it sounded like before. Before what? Maybe he was just sick? "Could you--" He coughed.

It was better not to speak.

"Okay, the room should be better for your eyes now," the voice replied, now further away. If the other person in the room had heard him ask where he was, he had decided to outright ignore it.

He would have thought it rude if he wasn’t processing so many other things at once.

He tried opening his eyes again, blinking several times as the pain began to subside.

"It's normal if they sting a bit," he heard the man say, his tone still patient and kind, "You've never used them before after all."

He looked at the man who was speaking. What had the girl called him before?

"Ren?"

Ren stepped closer, into the light that a candle provided on his right. After a short silence, Ren smiled.

He forgot to breathe. He pressed his lips together; he needed water. He closed his eyes once more, the first face he'd seen burned into his memory--a smile in the dim light of a candle that lit ash-colored eyes into fine, freshly baked coals. He had looked gentle but careful, like a man who had been broken once before-- cautious but kind. He understood pain but was hesitant to take risks of feeling it again. At least, that's what little he had been able to gather in those few seconds.

"Yes, that's right," Ren confirmed that the other had gotten his name right with a light chuckle, "I'm surprised you were able to hear and put together so much. You've been sleeping for a long time now." He heard him walk over and sit in the chair beside his bed, "Tell me, do you remember dreaming?"

He tried opening his eyes again. Looking at Ren, focusing on keeping his eyes on his, made the pain in his back seem somewhat further away, but the longer he kept his eyes open, the more the world around him felt unfamiliar. He didn’t want to see the ring above Ren’s head or the way the walls looked like watercolors or how everything appeared to be from another time or another world, one in which he was sure he had never existed in. So instead of seeing anything else, he kept staring into Ren’s eyes, and if he didn't move, maybe he'd be able to endure the pain and whatever was to come with this new reality without a whimper or a scream.

He recalled his dream. Darkness.

"A loud sound. That's it," he said, still wishing he had water.

"A loud sound?" Ren leaned in closer to him, "Like, how loud? Like thunder?"

"Yes, that loud," he shut his eyes again. He really couldn't remember anything else about his dream. The pain in his back was getting worse. He was sweating. Why was the dream important?

"Hmm, you don't remember anything else?" Ren asked thoughtfully.

"Just . . . pain," he offered. But, that pain had been different from what he was feeling now. That pain had been in his head. This pain was in his back, and it wasn't in one spot, but two. And it wasn’t sudden, unlike in his dream. His current pain was building, steadily, threatening to spread and overwhelm all of his other senses.

"I'm sorry if I made you recall something you didn't want to."

He tried to shake his head 'no', but it hurt his neck and back to do so, so his nose just ended up in the sheets instead. They smelled like rain.

"A loud sound like a clap of thunder . . ." Ren trailed off as if he'd been speaking his thoughts aloud, "Oh, well--maybe--"

"What is it?" he asked, his eyes squinting shut as another roll of pain overwhelmed him.

"Goro," Ren replied, with more affection than he thought anything in that moment deserved.

"What?" He could register that it was the onomatopoeia for thunder, but beyond that, he didn't understand the significance of such an infliction on the word.

"That will be your name," Ren decided.

"But my name is--" He stopped, his mouth and eyes open, searching the empty air for the last word in the sentence as his whole body tensed in fear. The word had gotten caught somewhere in his teeth despite being the most basic of information. The word he heard more often than any other.

His name.

What was his name?

How could he have forgotten his own name?!

"It's alright," Ren's voice was cotton in his ear attempting to muffle the noise of pain he felt radiating from his back to his fingertips.

But how could he recover from this? He tried to sit up again, but once more fell plummeting back to the bed with another wave of pain from his back. "I don't. I don't remember my name? Why can't I remember my name?!" He shook his head, tears stinging his eyes. Not just his name was missing.

He felt fingertips in his hair and another hand on his left arm, and, soon enough, fingers were brushing through his locks, attempting to calm him, "It's okay; everything is going to be okay."

He tried to shake his head, but he realized he’d been unsuccessful. His body had tensed in fear as if embracing itself for some unknown impact, "It hurts!” He tried to look at the other boy in the low light, “How will it be okay?” He didn’t mean to, but he saw them. The halo. The feathers. Were they actually attached to Ren’s body? “I don't know who I am!" he screamed.

"I understand," Ren replied softly, fingers still in his hair as he pet him gently, love in his touch.

"What's happening to me?!” he tried to yell, but it came out more as a strangled cry. “It hurts so much,” he couldn’t ignore it anymore, and he felt tears sting his eyes, “It hurts. Ren, please help me. I don’t—aaaugh!” He shut his eyes, trying to curl inside himself but the strain on his back made him lay flat again.

"Shit!” The hands disappeared and he heard the chair fall. “Just-hold on!” he heard Ren’s voice above him. He heard footsteps run frantically across the room and back to him, “Shit!"

"Aaaauughh!!!" he felt something break the skin on his back as it struggled to break free from beneath his skin.

"Here, bite this so you don't bite your tongue!"

He opened his eyes. Ren’s thumb wrapped in a bandage?

He complied just as he felt his back erupt, appendages he could not see sprouting forth and going immediately stiff, splattering blood across the room, the sheets, Ren. He screamed again from the pain that rippled through every fiber of his being before everything went suddenly black.

 

* * *

 

 

When he woke again, he could see Ren in the dim light. No, he could feel him. He was touching him, and he could feel a brush on him but what--

"It hurts," was the first thing he could manage. He hadn’t meant to complain, but it was all he could think about. He was living, breathing, deep inhale, slow exhale, but his body felt lifeless, weighed down, immobile.

Ren’s eyes were kind, his smile fond, "It will take some time getting used to, but they are a part of you." He let his eyes linger a moment too long on the dim, golden ring above the other’s head before looking down and to his left at the part of him that Ren was touching.

Feathers.

Feathers?

"What is this?" his eyes went as wide as they could go while still weighed down with exhaustion.

"Your wings,” he replied with a chuckle as if the answer were obvious, and, above all else, normal. Ren’s eyes traveled from his work to Goro’s eyes, “Is the water too cold? I have to brush the blood out. I've been at it awhile, so if you need warm water, just tell me."

"What?" None of this was making any sense. Halos. Wings. Angels? He watched the brush Ren was using travel from the feathers to a small pan on a chair beside him to be rinsed free of blood before it traveled back to brush at the blood-soaked feathers again.

He could feel the brush, the care in each stroke. It wasn’t touching him, but he could--

"If it's too much to take in, you can rest. I won't go anywhere, Goro."

"Goro?"

"Yes,” and Ren chuckled again, still sounding far more fond than Goro felt appropriate. “Remember, that’s your name.”

Goro watched him for several more minutes, fighting to stay awake as he tried to process once more what was happening to him, or rather, what had already come to pass . . .

"Ren?" he asked quietly, feeling apprehension not because of who he was speaking to but because of what he was speaking of.

"Hmm?" Gray eyes flickered over to his only a second before going back to his work, careful and tender.

"Is this the afterlife?" Goro asked, expecting he knew the answer already but needing to hear it from someone else.

Ren smiled, wider than Goro had yet seen. He stopped his work and met Goro’s eyes. "I don't know, but, probably not."

Surprised he was satisfied with the answer, Goro gave into sleep.

 

* * *

 

 

The next day, he woke up to the sound of distant laughing, and closer by, a chuckle he recognized instantly.

“Ren?”

“You’re awake?”

Goro opened his eyes and immediately shut them. The light from the sun still hurt. With his eyes closed, he could hear someone shutting the door to the balcony outside quickly and sliding the curtains. He opened his eyes again, and then shut them tightly once more with a hiss.

“I left the curtains open. You’re going to have to adjust. You can’t keep your eyes closed to the world forever.”

Goro didn’t appreciate the accusation even if it wasn’t meant as one, and he slowly opened his eyes once more, his focus solely on Ren.

He was so plainly beautiful, like everything about him was effortless and flawless all the same. He watched as he walked over to him, picked up the glass of water at his bedside and handed it out to him. This close, he could easily see it now. The ring really was floating above his head like in the Christian faith, like an angel.

But also.

“You have wings?” He sat up slowly to take the glass of water, their fingers inevitably touching as he did.

“That’s right. And so do you.”

After drinking all of the water and setting it down on the nightstand, he peered over his shoulder curiously. They weren’t white. That was the first thing he noticed. On top of that, they weren’t very large. They certainly wouldn’t carry his body weight. Mystified, he reached his left hand to touch the wing on his right.

He could feel it. They were actually attached to his body. Like Ren had said, a part of him. “But I’m human.”

“Maybe you were once, but now, you’re a haibane,” he replied patiently.

“Haibane?” Goro hadn’t heard the word before.

“With beautiful charcoal gray feathers,” his eyes smiled.

“I don’t understand. Why can’t— I can’t remember anything,” he was grateful his eyes were adjusting, but it brought back the reality that nothing was familiar. The walls. The clothes. The furniture. Even his own body.

“It’s the same for all of us. No one remembers who they were or where they came from before they arrived here. And no one remembers you. All we have is our dream and this town.”

“The loud sound?” Goro clarified, eyes searching.

“That’s right.”

Goro took a deep breath and released it slowly. He’d start with a simpler question. “Where am I?”

“This is Leblanc. It’s an orphanage that doubles as a coffee shop and cafe in the town of Palace.” Ren stepped closer to him and put his hands on Goro’s. Goro’s hands were larger, but he couldn’t help but feel comforted by them. Ren's hands had stroked his hair when he’d been scared. They’d worked tirelessly to brush the blood from his body. And now . . . “Can you stand?”

And now, they would help him take his first steps.

Goro tried to stand without Ren’s assistance, relying on his legs alone, but he had soon found himself seated back in the bed once more. He shut his eyes tight. The impact had shot pain up his back. His wings still hurt, still felt sore even though he wasn’t consciously making the effort to move them, and they twitched every time he moved as if he had no control over them. Ren watched him, waiting and ready, so he tried standing again, this time pulling on Ren’s hands for support. He fell forward, but the other haibane wouldn’t let him fall. Ren stood his ground, and his arms wrapped around him in support. “It’s alright,” he assured him. “We’ll take it slow.”

“Where are the children?” he asked suddenly, a blush rising to his cheeks as Ren helped him steady himself.

“Playing outside, mostly. Can’t you hear them?”

All he could hear was Ren and the sound of his own heartbeat, but when he registered the distant laughter once more, he agreed. Standing straight, he realized he was taller than Ren, though not by much. The mysterious halo floated over his head soundlessly, and the only thing that pulled Goro from his stare was, once again, that same, firm voice. “I’m going to let go.”

Goro nearly begged him not to. There were too many reasons he still needed him close. The physical support, his touch, his smell, his soothing voice . . . Did he have any idea how he was making him feel? No, Goro couldn't remember anything from his time before he had woken up in that bed, but the feeling Ren gave him--like he mattered-- like he was important, it struck a chord inside him. He felt like it was an entirely unfamiliar concept, as if, in whatever had come before this life now, he'd never been treated with kindness. Did Ren have any idea how enticing it was?

Ren, very carefully, stepped away, and Goro steadied himself on his own two feet. His legs felt weak, and his back was still in pain as he leaned his weight into the heels of his bare feet.

Ren opened the balcony doors and Goro shielded himself from the sun, his back aching in pain when he brought up his arms.

He had turned back around when Goro finally put his arms down, his eyes taking in the sky and a few buildings outside and in the distance. He yearned for something to look familiar, but his only comfort was that the sky was still blue and the sun was still warm.

He turned his attention to Ren who had picked up something dark, heavy, and circular from the small table by the bed Goro had been in. "I almost forgot this," he said as walked past Goro to set it on a large table that was positioned in front of the balcony doors.

Goro's mouth opened to speak, but nothing came out. It couldn't be.

"Um, I'm not sure where the tongs are . . ." Ren's gray eyes scanned the room.

"That's not for me, is it?" Goro still didn't move as he gathered his strength to keep himself standing.

"Who else would it be for?" Ren asked, opening the lid to reveal a single, golden ring that matched his own in every way.

"But--"

"I told you. We're the same. You're a haibane," Ren insisted, entirely transparent.

Goro blushed. He wasn't sure what to think.

That's when Ren pulled a chair out from under the table and motioned for him to move, "Here, come closer."

Goro took a shaky step towards him, then another, and another. With each step, he could feel the wings on his back. They were very real, and Ren was right; they were very much a part of him.

Holding the mold for the glowing ring, Ren stood up on the chair in front of Goro, "Turn around."

Goro regarded him suspiciously. "Wait, what are you going to do?" Hadn't he just said he needed tongs?

Ren's smooth voice eased over him, "Just trust me. I've taken care of you so far, right?"

Goro blushed, nodding once before turning his back to Ren.

"Sorry, there isn't much ceremony."

Before Goro could respond, he felt something warm on his head bounce up once. Instinctively, his hands went up to touch his hair, but Ren said quickly, "Careful, don't touch it. It's still hot."

"Did it . . . ?" He wasn't even sure how to ask.

That's when he heard Ren chuckle, and finally, laugh, "I can't believe that actually worked."

Goro stepped away, turning around more quickly than he should have to protest, "You said to trust you!"

Smiling, Ren shrugged, "It worked at least. It's staying."

Goro looked up. He could just barely make out the edge of the ring, "It's really there?"

"Yeah. May the light guide your way, or something . . ." Ren replied, his voice trailing off.

Goro snorted, "So inspirational."

"I do what I can," he replied.

Goro smiled at him, and Ren stepped down from the chair, "On behalf of the Haibane, welcome to Leblanc." Ren set down the mold, and that's when he noticed it. There was a band-aid around his thumb.

"Your thumb."

He'd been hurt, and it was Goro's fault.

"It's nothing." Ren responded, clearly unaffected by it, "Certainly nothing like the pain of sprouting wings."

Goro shook his head, "And then you brushed the blood out . . . it must have taken . . ."

"Only a few hours. It's really nothing."

Goro took in his presence once more, drinking in the sight of him as he tried to decide how he truly felt. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," he responded quickly.

“Ren-kun!! Show us! I wanna see!”

"The children?" Goro asked, turning his attention to the balcony doors.

Ren didn't respond but instead walked outside and looked down over the railing and waved.

“Is he there?” Goro heard a boy ask.

“I wanna see the new haibane!” a girl yelled up. It sounded like the one he'd heard yesterday. Ann, was it?

Goro took a deep breath and released it. Nothing was making sense. He still longed for something familiar, but at least Ren was here to guide him. He seemed like a genuinely good-natured person, and children, for the most part, didn't lie. If they loved him, it was likely deserved. He looked to Ren first before trying to take so many steps on his own. He had a better view now of Ren’s wings from where he was standing. “Do mine look like that?” Charcoal gray. Too small to have any sort of purpose. More like a bird than an angel.

“Yes. There is a mirror I Karoi's room we can bring here if you like."

Goro nodded before waking closer to the ledge and resting down on the railing. He stood beside Ren but used the railing to keep himself steady. Below were five children, all with identical wings of charcoal gray feathers and a cat.

“There he is!” The blonde girl yelled. He recognized the voice. It must have been Ann.

“He’s pretty!” The girl with the curly hair yelled up.

“He doesn’t look very strong.” the blonde boy said next.

“You’re not supposed to say things like that, Ryuji!” said the brunette who looked to be at least a year or two older than the rest of them.

“But he doesn’t,” insisted the boy.

Ren spoke next, “This is Goro, everyone. Say 'hi'.”

“Goro-onii-san!” Ann yelled up, her wings stretching out as if she were attempting to fly up to meet him.

“Like thunder?” the other boy asked, his voice thoughtful.

“Ahh, nevermind, that’s a badass name he-“

“Ryuji! Language!” the older brunette corrected him.

“Sorry, Mako-chan,” he apologized.

Goro smiled, seeing the children’s fascination made him feel warm. He waved down to them, “Nice to meet you!”

“Ren-kun! Is it them?” asked the girl beside Ann. he could recall her voice, too.

“He’s a boy, Shiho-Chan!” Ann insisted.

“So?” she argued back.

“So, he’s waiting for his wife!” Ann corrected her.

“His wife could be a boy!” Shiho countered, her feathers ruffling.

“That doesn’t make any sense!” Ryuji sided with Ann.

“Who are they talking about?” Goro looked to Ren who was watching him, a serene expression on his face.

“My true love,” he answered easily.

“What?” Goro felt himself blush, and he looked back down at the children immediately.

Ren went on to explain. “In my dream, I couldn’t see anything; I could hear crows, and all I could sense was this deep, endless love.”

Goro looked back to him, waiting.

Their eyes met, and Goro was taken aback by the other's sincerity, “My name is short for Renai. To fall in love.”

Gray eyes caught red ones, and they both stared, eyes searching.

Goro decided he wanted to be that person. He wanted to be Ren's true love, whatever that meant or would entail. In a world he knew nothing of and no one knew of him, he decided, then and there, he wanted to know Ren, and he wanted Ren to know him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I'm sure no one was expecting a Haibane Renmei crossover. You're not alone. I'm not sure what happened.  
> But yeah, call it a recurring dream.  
> And yes, true names and allusions to suicide.  
> OTL  
> Sometimes, these things just happen.


	5. Studio

Bishopp Briggs screeched throughout the studio, all soul and bass without concern for mercy. In the front of the room a single dancer performed to the empty studio, his only company his reflection in the mirror. Stiletto heels and legs and long hair stuck safe with sweat to his skin, the dancer seduced the invisible audience into immediate submission. His eyes ruthless knives made to cut through conviction and self-restraint, he moved with liquid grace, mercury in his muscles and sex in the swing of his hips. In time with the music, quick in a single beat or frozen in a place for another, he was the pride of the newly famous Shibuya studio.

To the floor and back up again, knees bent, legs straight, a high kick and a hand down his visible abs, the dancer rehearsed the motions with the song on repeat until he was flawless . . . until he was satisfied. His choreography was already famous in Tokyo, but he wanted more than just that. He needed more people to see what he was capable of, more people to see his talent, more people to love h--

"So this is why this place closes at 10?"

The dancer had just shut off the speaker system, his phone in his hand as he unplugged it. When he turned around to see the source of the voice, he could see a man about his age, maybe a touch younger, with black, curly hair, nondescript, black-rimmed glasses, and a smirk just wide enough that made him want to punch the damn thing right off his face.

"You're the transfer from Sendai, right?" the dancer asked as the cocky bastard walked closer. He already didn't like him. Aside from the rumors, there was the fact that he was here when he shouldn't be. Then, of course, he was eavesdropping on top of it. Goro hated being watched when he was developing new choreography; he appreciated that his art be uninterrupted.

“And you're the . . . what was it? Prince of Dance?” the stranger asked, clearly mocking the nickname despite the tone in his voice.

Goro narrowed red eyes in his direction, “I didn’t choose the title,” he said evenly. It had been given to him nearly two years ago now due to his talents in mastering many forms of dance--never content to remain proficient in a single style.

“They would stop if you told them to, I’m sure," the other pointed out, smiling.

“How'd you get in?" He didn't care for the newbie's opinions, and he was definitely not interested in his advice.

"I basically adopted Futaba-chan as my little sister. She let me in," he replied.

Goro didn't appreciate that; the Sakura family actually owned the studio, but he was the one who basically managed everything on top of bringing it recognition and many, many more members. "You've been here a week; you work quickly."

Without warning, the transfer mimicked one of the moves Goro had just developed in the dance he'd been practicing and, by doing so, crossed the short distance between them until he was right in front of the choreographer, "What can I say? People like me."

Goro scowled. Who the hell did this guy think he was?! Goro closed his eyes and inhaled, exhaling slowly to keep himself from smacking the guy across the face. “What do you want? Kurusu, was it?”

"Just this," he replied cryptically.

Their eyes met, and Goro set his phone down without looking away, his own eyes searching for answers in--

Deja-Vu.

He'd experienced this before. Somewhere. At some point in time, this exact feeling had washed over him--undeniable attraction despite pain that couldn't be counted in words.

Was it love? Or just lust? Did it matter?

He wanted his name on Kurusu's lips as he came while Goro slammed inside him.

"What are you thinking?"

Crushing reality.

"Akira?" Goro blinked, the Prince of Dance dissipating into smoke. "Another dream?"

Akira shrugged, his cocky attitude gone completely and replaced with a quiet somberness that set on his face like a satire mask, "Yeah, seems to be. I'm not going to get used to that."

Goro understood. One second he was one person and the next second, he was himself again. It was shocking how difficult the change was despite both of the personas being representations of himself. Each time he remembered himself, it made him wonder just who and what _'himself_ ' actually was, especially since he'd supposedly died. "Makes two of us." He was still that person who had died on the ship, right? Or was he the Prince of Dance? The new kid in Purgatory? The social work major? What would be next? How long would this go on?

"Did you find my body?"

Akira looked surprised. "No, um, no, not yet."

Suspicious.

Goro sat down on the floor, the defined muscles on his back visible from his thin tank. Before he could ask for an update on what was actually going on in the world that he'd left, Akira spoke next, “It was wrong . . . killing yourself like that. For the record, I’d rather die a slow, painful death than watch you kill yourself.” Akira sat down across from him, but he didn't face him. Instead, he stretched his legs out in front of him and absently knocked his toes together as he leaned back on his hands.

“What are you talking about?” Goro asked.

Akira didn't look at him, but his voice suddenly carried a weight of defeat. The words themselves barely even made it to Goro's ears. “You’re pretending you don’t remember?”

Goro sighed, trying to remember what had happened since he'd died. Oh, right, the floating blood and the severed limb. “You mean the dream with the wall?"

Akira looked up at him, remaining in the same position, "Yes. The one in which I had to watch you slit your throat open," he clarified.

Akechi said nothing. It was a nightmare best left forgotten. Akira was wrong to assume he was the one who'd had to take the brunt of the horror.

"I know you did it for me," Akira said gently. His tone reminded Akechi of Ren. No, they were the same person; that didn't make sense.

Goro stared, confused by the words, but not showing it on his face. That didn't make any sense.

Akira went on, "I know you were trying to protect me."

Blank.

"What?"

"You were trying to make me think of myself rather than trying to help you," Akira told him. He shook his head, as he looked into the mirror, his curly hair bouncing slightly as he smiled bitterly.

Akechi regarded him with mocking disbelief, a scoff at the ready, "I knew you were a fool, but I had no idea you were crazy. I did it because I didn't want to be there anymore, and, unlike you, I can't wake myself up."

Akira said nothing, and Akechi was left convinced he simply wasn't accepting the truth.

"In all transparency, Kurusu, your behavior was horrifying; I merely wanted to escape that hell of watching you paint words with the bloody stump that was once your hand."

Akira clearly didn't appreciate the labels Goro was applying, "I was just worried about you. You were so withdrawn."

"Just stop," Goro threatened.

But. of course, Akira did not, "And in that apartment, you--"

"Shut up, Kurusu, before you say something you'll regret," Goro grit his teeth. Difficult as it was to hear Akira's obsession with him verbalized from his own mouth, it was even more upsetting to hear just how far off his understanding was of Goro, himself. It was as if Akira had created an image of him and was basing all of his understanding off of that single image, never correcting his idea of Akechi no matter the evidence reality provided.

"You're the last person I need a lecture from," Akira finally said, now at least somewhat unhappy with the course of their conversation.

It pleased Akechi to hear Kurusu's resignation on his lips, but Akechi felt it best to change the topic of conversation altogether. He didn't want to think on that particular dreamscape ever again. Instead, he remembered their conversation on the train, "You promised you'd find my body."

"And I will," Akira said confidently, his eyes trapping Akechi's.

" . . . Because I can't keep doing this," Akechi said softly, wishing he had it in him to actually carry some kind of threat.

"I'll save you," Akira smiled again.

Akechi frowned, his voice cold and indifferent, or at least, he hoped it was, "Don't talk like that. Haven't you learned anything?"

Without warning, Akira moved suddenly, his body beside Goro as he quickly left a kiss on his cheek before leaning in to whisper into his ear, "I love you. Haven't you learned anything?"

Goro stared at their reflection in the mirror, Akira leaning into him leaving only a sliver of space between them. There was a crack in the glass that caught their reflection, splitting it vertically. Had it been there all this time?  Did it matter?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, that was kind of pleasant. That's nice, right?  
> I'm sorry; these are written before I fall asleep, so I am struggling to stay awake and never take the time to edit them properly. OTL  
> Also, dance sequence inspired by [this choreography here.](https://youtu.be/OLtdj-DGM8o)


	6. Box

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Turn back now if you like happy stories. Also, if you like happy stories, how did you end up here? Also, it ends abruptly. So, head's up.

Akira rolled his neck to the left, then the right, and back again, popping the bones and stretching the muscles to ebb away the tension from the day's events. As he walked down the hallway of the gaudy hotel in Osaka, he reviewed the conversation he'd just had with Japan's Prime Minister.

 _'You're steadily gaining popularity in the polls. We could use a man with your charisma.'_ Prime Minister Shido had said. 

_'I believe my allegiance to Toranosuke is obvious; I won't take part in your party's parlor tricks no matter how much money you wave in my face.'_

_'Toranosuke's recent following is entirely due to your efforts, your face, and your words. Surely you know better than to believe that Toranosuke is **your** superior on this stage. You could be so much more than his lackey.' _

_'You're right; I'm his **secretary**. Now, as much as I'd enjoy listening to you spill more evidence of your shit character since it will make taking you down even more satisfying, I have a rally to prepare for tomorrow, so if you'll excuse me.' _

_'You have made an enemy of the wrong man.'_

_'We are both operating in the service of the Japanese people. If anything, we should be working together for its betterment regardless of our personal loyalties. Goodnight.'_

He'd left before the bald bastard could say another word.

Fuck Shido. He was arrogant, self-centered, a liar, and, his biggest fault, proud to the point of blindness. So what if it was the makings of a typical politician? Japan and most of the world had been entirely corrupted, debased, some countries nearly completely destroyed by either war or economic collapse in the last five years. Japan could not afford another term with Shido or any man like him.

Akira supported Toranosuke first and foremost because he was honest, transparent even, and he was humble to the point that many people were touched by his appeals to the common person and how he was just the same as them, wanting to do good in a society that had become rotten nearly to its core.

Japan had changed too much too quickly. After the recent economic collapse, the reinstatement of slavery to pay off one's debts had transformed the centuries of culture into something twisted and defunct. Essentially, in the time that Shido had become Prime Minister of Japan, the country had fallen back in time several centuries on some issues while dominating world powers in others.

Akira pulled out his hotel key card from his breast pocket with a blank expression. It was a wonder the government had held up this long; it felt too easy for Shido to turn around and declare himself dictator. He pulled the card from the slot in the handle and the light on the knob turned green. He opened the door of the room and walked in to find the light, sliding his shoes off in the process. He knew Yoshida would never let Shido become a dictator, but still, it was a wonder any part of the country had survived up to this point. Shido had done so much damage in a mere three years; it didn't even feel like the same Japan he'd known growing up. Akira often found himself wondering how long it would take to undo it all. He walked into the small room and noticed something out of place immediately. Impossible to miss, there was a large cardboard box sitting, motionless and silent in the middle of the gray comforter of the single standard size bed.

_'You have made an enemy of the wrong man.'_

Akira tossed the key card on the dresser and walked over to the box on the bed, taking enough precaution that he didn't touch it or move it unnecessarily. He'd have to first determine if it was dangerous or not.

And that's when he heard it sneeze.

It was muffled, but clearly a sneeze, and with it, the box shook once and then went still again.

There was a person inside? What the hell?

"Can you tell me your name?" he asked carefully, knowing that the information wasn't exactly important but it was enough that it would likely get him to what was pertinent faster if he first established a personal connection with the person in the box.

"Hm-Hm," a voice responded.

Whoever it was, they were gagged. Well, that wouldn't help much.

Akira stared a moment more at the stiff cardboard in front of him before finally making a decision. He climbed up on the bed, standing, put his hands on the lid of the box, and pulled with far more force than necessary. The lid came away easily, and even though little light could get in since only the lamps in the room were lit, it was clear to make out that indeed, there was a person inside.

In the box was a male, around his age, fabric wrapped around his eyes and his mouth. His hands were tied together, and his feet were bound. He was wearing what looked to be a navy-colored suit, but his feet were bare. He sat huddled, his hands between his legs with a large manilla envelope between them. His head had been bent down to his knees, but with the lid removed, he looked up despite his vision being entirely impaired. He didn't, however, attempt to communicate at all.

Akira took in the picture once more, ever cautious. He had to be. He'd essentially just been threatened by the Prime Minister for declining his ridiculous offer. He, who had likely killed others for less, was not someone Akira could shrug off and ignore. If anything, he was Yoshida's single most formidable enemy, which made him Akira's as well.

"Are you here to kill me?"

The man in the box, after a long pause, finally shook his head ' _no_ '. Akira noted the exceptional wait time.

"Is this envelope for me?"

The man nodded.

Akira shook his head; he'd call the situation bizarre if he hadn't seen so many strings of nasty tricks already come Yoshida's way. Without another word, Akira took the envelope and opened it carefully. It hadn't traveled through the mail. Wherever the man in the box had come from, the contents of the manilla envelope was from the same source and that meant that it was known by only a handful of people most likely.

There were several sheets of paper stapled together with a title page:

**DEED OF OWNERSHIP of AKECHI GORO**

Akira blinked, turning the pages and scanning quickly. He'd never seen one before, but the watermarks were accurate and on the last page, the signature of one Masayoshi Shido was present along with the title of Kurusu Akira as owner. It was all there.

The man in the box was a slave, and Masayoshi Shido had handed his ownership over to Akira without his consent. Legally, Akira was contractually bound as the owner of another human being.

It went against everything himself and Yoshida were fighting for. It contradicted their whole platform. It was . . . _disgusting_. It was both a smart move on Shido's part and a devastating attack on Kurusu's reputation if it got out.

" _Fuck_."

The man in the box, Akechi rather, didn't move and waited instead for Akira to make a move, to tell him something to do, anything that would signal to him that he'd been accepted in some way. He remained silent, an object waiting, constant and humbled, to be used.

"You're a slave." His anger processed, "Fuck! . . . That fucking bastard." Akira grit his teeth, his little episode over in a short burst. He rarely expressed his anger so openly, but this--this was something irreversible. He couldn't just give Akechi back, and, by law, he couldn't just free him, either. Wait, what even were his crimes? No, stop, that could wait. He was a _human being_ and therefore did not belong in a box, bound and gagged. Who knew how long he'd even been sitting there?

"I'm going to untie the blindfold. Do you promise not to move?"

Akechi Goro nodded three times, quickly, and then went completely still once more. Akira cursed again under his breath. Again, slavery had been reinstated only recently, but a lifetime's worth of damage could be done in a single night, and if this man was owned by Shido then who knew what he'd endured?

With the blindfold removed, Akira could see the blood-red color of the slave's eyes. They wouldn't look up to meet his, and instead, stared at a spot just to the left of his neck, as if his shoulder were his face. Akira noticed it right away, and, without thought to Akechi's position, said, "Hey, look at me, okay? It's alright. We're equals."

Akechi only glanced quickly to meet his eyes, less even than a second, before he closed his eyes and went back to being still, silent, and submissive.

Akira was not ready for this. He could not handle it. This time, without warning, he reached into the box and undid the other strip of fabric that was around the slave's head, removing it so that he could freely speak.

He didn't.

"Can you stand?"

Again, he didn't speak, but instead shifted, and, with great effort and a wince of his eyes, he stood.

Before anything else, Akira noticed that he was taller than him. But, as his eyes drank him in, he began to notice other things: his jaw, his lips, his hair that hung to his shoulders, how square his shoulders actually were, his posture, his hands, his bare feet, and then finally, at the bottom of the box, a pair of socks and a pair of shoes.

 _''Well how decent of you, Shido,_ ' Akira thought with a sneer.

"I'm going to free your hands, and when I do, you can untie your feet and step out, okay?" He paused halfway to the other's hands and looked up at him curiously, "You're not going to run away or anything, right?"

Akechi shook his head, his eyes expressing just a touch of fear, like a child who had been accused of something they hadn't done but had no proof to prove otherwise. Akechi was still not parting his lips to speak. At this point, it wasn't even safe to rule out that, potentially, he didn't speak at all, and that's why he was so quiet.

Akira meticulously untied his wrists, careful not to initiate any skin contact if he could help it. He couldn't imagine what the title of ' _slave_ ' could do to a person's pride, but he doubted it did anything to help the man's ego. It would be best to treat him with as much respect as possible.

After Akechi had untied his feet, he stepped out of the box, took out the socks and shoes from the box, stepped off the bed to the floor, and looked up at Akira's shoulder expectantly.

The secretary sighed, trying not to take out his frustrations towards Shido on the stranger in his hotel room. With the box set aside in the corner, and the documents on the dresser, Akira approached Akechi with an extended hand, "I'm Kurusu Akira. Nice to meet you."

Akechi moved his shoes and socks into a fold in one arm and then met his hand with his own,  "Pleased to meet you, Master. My legal name is Akechi Goro, but you may call me whatever it is that you wish."

Akira processed the man's words very slowly, his voice an earworm with words he could not recall. Akechi Goro. Akechi Goro. Who are you, Akechi Goro?

"Please don't ever call me ' _Master_ ' again. Like I said, we're equals. You can call me Akira. Everyone does. And you . . . if you want to go by Akechi-san, then that's what I'll call you. Whatever you want to be called. Your wish. Not mine. It's your name."

Their eyes met again, and this time, Akechi actually didn't look away, much to Akira's relief.

"Akechi-san is fine," he repeated back even the honorific. Akira tried not to cringe.

"You can put your things down anywhere," Akira said awkwardly, not sure what to do with the situation. "You don't have anything else to wear, right? It's late."

"No, sir."

"Wow, um, please don't call me _'sir_ ', either. Like I said, Akira is fine." He added quickly, "And no honorifics, either. Literally just Akira."

"Akira," he tried nervously, setting his shoes down beside the dresser before walking back over to face him.

Akira sat down on the bed, his eyes still on Akechi, "Did you always belong to Shido? Since . . . since the law passed?"

"Yes," the other answered simply, his face expressionless.

Akira studied it. He wondered how well the other was at lying. He had read studies about people who had become slaves completely dissociating themselves from what was happening around them. He didn't want to lump Akechi in as a stereotype, but he had little to go off of at this point, and he couldn't be too careful. "You don't belong to anyone now, okay? I'll . . . take care of you." He corrected himself, "I mean, as much as you need me to, but you--You don't belong to me."

Akechi stood in front of him, his face remaining impassive, "But, Akira-sa-Akira, I--"

"Legally, okay, yes, I get it, but it's not going to remain that way." He trusted Yoshida, otherwise, he wouldn't have come so far with him, "We're going to end this. You'll be free soon, I promise. Until then, just focus on seeing yourself as your own person again."

"I am my own person," Akechi said simply, a human tone finally adding color to his words.

It sent a wave of relief through Akira, "Good. Good, then."

There was a heavy silence in the air, a span of time in which neither of them spoke. Akira was attempting to piece together what he'd explain to Yoshida, what little he'd leave out, how he'd need to face the public if Shido brought the scandal immediately to light. There was too much to consider. He honestly just wanted to sleep. And then there was Akechi, himself. He had just made a promise to him, but how would he follow through on it now that he was in this position? Would it be best to just separate himself from Yoshida entirely?

"Aren't you going to ask what my debts are?" Akechi finally asked, still standing in front of Akira like some kind of pet waiting for its master to either pet him or throw the ball.

Akira looked up again, "No." He stood up and began going through the small suitcase he'd placed on the dresser to pull out clothing for Akechi to sleep in and some for himself. "You're welcome to tell me, but that's your business. I guess I need to know your term if your end date is coming up soon, though." He laid out the clothing for Akechi and began to undo his own tie. "Will this work for you?"

"Yes, thank you." And then, he moved suddenly, his hands at Akira's neck, fingers nimble as they took over in pulling the tie loose and beginning to undo the buttons, "I have no end date."

Akira stepped away quickly, blushing slightly, "I have it. Thanks." Akechi was trying to help him undress? Akira saw him do the same for Shido in the back of his mind and squinted his eyes shut in an attempt to remove the image from his mind.

Fuck Masayoshi Shido.

Akechi's hands fell instantly to his side, and he almost looked hurt. "I carry a life sentence," he continued.

Akira didn't respond as he hung up his suit jacket and folded his tie. He should just get dressed in the bathroom.

"I killed many people for Shido," he added, robotically, like he'd pulled the trigger lifetimes ago, so the effects of such a deed had been all but forgotten.

Akira froze, his eyes widening as he stared at a spot on the hotel room floor. "Oh . . ." What did that even mean if you were a slave bound by a contract to be obedient to your master? It hadn't come up in court yet, surprisingly enough, but Akira was sure it was only a matter of time. He tried to change the subject, " . . . But you're not going to kill me?" His gray eyes met Akechi's red ones. He noticed they no longer looked so bright. Had he been imagining it before, or had Akechi's eyes just caught the light when he'd first seen him?

"I belong to you. If you tell me to, I could kill for you as well," he offered without emotion, no strings attached, a simple request responded by a simple execution.

Akira was horrified, "What? No. I don't want that." He reminded himself that monsters were made, not born.

"I have other uses," Akechi offered quickly, his voice taking on a new quality, sounding eager now.

Akira would have found it cute outside the given circumstances.

"I am skilled in abduction, spying, reconnaissance, torture, disguise--"

He cut him off, "I don't operate that way. None of that will be necessary." He tried to remain neutral and nonjudgemental. It had been apparent almost immediately that Akechi Goro had likely been changed, whether by abuse or conditioning, during his time in slavery.

Goro took a step closer to him, still eager, "I can also perform other duties. I can cook, clean, give massages, perform fellatio and anal sex, give or take, of course. I can also--"

"Stop. Please stop," Akira cut him off once more, his neck feeling warm. Akechi seemed to have no self-worth at all. His condition was disturbing, but even that fact wasn't enough to keep Akira's imagination from running rampant and wild--his hands in the other's beautiful hair as he fucked him in the mouth cum spilling out the side over his lips and down his chin.

Fuck. He was so disgusting.

Akechi went silent, and Akira returned to the present immediately. Wait, if Akechi were offering these skills, then, did that mean . . . ?

"Did you . . . do all of those things for Shido?" he dared to ask.

Akechi didn't seem to understand the implications, because he replied quickly, vaguely, insistent that his loyalty shouldn't be questioned. "I did whatever was asked of me. I'm quite obedient. You can ask anything of me to--"

"I'm not," Akira said quickly, almost stern. He hadn't meant to be, but it upset him to think that another human being had been treated this way, and that, in truth, Akechi Goro was probably just one of many.

Silence again fell between them. Akechi waited with his hands folded one over the other in front of him. His shoes and socks were on the floor beside the dresser. "You should change," he suggested.

Akechi immediately turned to the clothing Akira had left him on the bed and began removing his tie. Akira moved to the bathroom and shut the door behind him. He got dressed quickly, his mind still firing off in a million directions. What was he going to do with him? One thing at a time. He'd need to sleep in the bed. tomorrow, he could stay at the hotel during the rally. Akira could get him money and a shinkansen ticket back to Tokyo. He'd be moving in to live with him, then? Well, for now, he'd have to. There was a term that had to be served with each owner. He couldn't remember if it was three or five months. But fuck, what would happen to Akechi after that if he relinquished ownership rights back to the government? No, he didn't owe him anything, but he did know that if he stayed with him, he would never have to kill someone again. Akira would never mistreat him. It would be safer, then, if Akechi remained his. No, no, not _his_. He was a person. If Akechi remained in his care. Right.

When Akira walked back into the room, Akechi was standing in the exact same spot and in the same position, his hands clasped in front of him. His clothes were the ones Akria had laid out from him and his blue suit was folded expertly on top of the dresser. Akira's clothes didn't fit Akechi very well, but, luckily, he wore baggy pajamas to bed, so they weren't actually tight on Akechi.

"You should, um, sit down," Akira suggested awkwardly.

And so, he did, in the same spot he'd been standing, right there, on the floor.

"Sit in the bed or the chair, whatever you prefer," Akira corrected, trying not to wince. He ran a hand through his hair and watched Akechi move to the bed nervously. Akira walked over to the chair and moved it to face him directly.

"Akechi-san . . . before all of this, do you remember what you wanted?"

"I'm a slave. I do not have ' _wants_ '," he responded in a carefully memorized line.

"Desires?" Akira tried, "You're human. Of course you do."

Akechi neither confirmed or denied Akira's line of thinking.

The secretary's gray eyes stared at the hotel carpet a moment too long before succeeding in catching Akechi's eyes watching him. He held them, steadfast, "I want to know. What did you want before everything went to shit?"

Akechi didn't look away, didn't blink. "Revenge."

"Revenge? For who?"

"Myself and my mother."

"On who?"

Akechi finally looked away, appearing ashamed.

"Against who?" Akira asked again, insistent.

Akechi's face finally contorted into a barely sealed rage, "My former master."

"Wait, what you're saying is--"

Akechi looked back into Akira's gray eyes, and Akira forgot to breathe.

"Masayoshi Shido is my biological father."

The color drained from Akira's face.

Akechi kept going, "To him, I was just a tool, an assassin. Nothing more."

When he said nothing else, Akira finally exhaled, his heart now picked up in pace, "Do you . . . still want it?" It was clear now that Akechi Goro was more human than most. That light in his eyes had returned, and there was a passion in his voice Akira had heard from few people in his life, and in his line of work, he'd heard plenty of so-called passionate people speak.

"Revenge?" And then Akechi remembered himself, and he looked down again, nervous once more, "May I . . . speak freely?"

"Please do."

His fingers were interlaced, resting in his lap like a rehearsed position in a dance. His hair fell around his face and when he looked at his owner a free man, " _I don't want anything else._ "

Akira's eyes widened slightly as the words settled in his mind. There was something incredibly _off_ about Akechi Goro, something dull and empty.

"I'll help you."

Akechi said nothing, the submissive demeanor befalling him once more as though he were jumping back into character.

"Under one condition."

"Yes?" Akechi sounded sure he could fulfill it even without hearing it.

"Learn to live."

He clearly had never expected that.

Akira leaned back in the chair and elaborated, "Your life. If you learn to live your life, if you learn to be happy, I'll help you." Akira, like he did most of his life, was making this all up as he went, but, it had yet to lead him astray. Hopefully, this was what Akechi needed. Hopefully, this would work. Hopefully.

"That--" Akechi stopped himself mid-sentence, and it was clearly because he was internally struggling with whether or not he was overstepping his boundaries.

"Like I said, you may speak freely," Akira offered patiently.

"That doesn't make any sense," Akechi responded in barely a whisper. His self-restraint was amazing to Akira. He had been clearly angered by his words, but whatever had happened to him in these last few years had taught him that resistance was more often than not, futile.

"Why not?" Akira smiled.

"I won't be happy until he is dead," Akechi admitted, louder this time, but still timid despite the meaning of his words.

Akira hoped all of this was pointing to progress, but a chill up his spine told him he was wrong. "Or so you think. And besides, that's why I said ' _learn_ '."

Akechi went silent, and when Akira was sure he wasn't going to say anything else, he spoke instead, "Masayoshi Shido deserves nothing more than a slow and painful death alone in a cell somewhere, but, with how things are now, that's not going to happen anytime soon." He added, after a beat, "I want you to feel free to do what you want."

"What I want?" Akechi looked up, startled as if the concept were still new despite what he'd revealed concerning his desire for revenge.

"That's right," Akira replied, hoping he'd created some kind of space for Akechi.

Neither of them said anything, but a tension had filled the room. Akechi was studying him, looking him over like he was seeing him for the first time. It made him feel a mix of emotions: anxious, relieved, and aroused all at once.

"I want to kiss you," Akechi admitted.

"Honestly?" Akira felt warm again, not expecting the words to come from the other's mouth ever, especially not right in that moment as his first request as an almost free man.

"I find you attractive," Akechi replied, his tone very matter-of-fact.

Akira, now blushing slightly, nodded his permission, but when Akechi crossed the distance between them, leaned in, tilted his head, and pressed his lips to his, the tension snapped, releasing suddenly whatever had been holding Akechi’s self-restraint back. In seconds, their tongues tied, Akechi had straddled him, pinned him to the chair, and left him gasping for air.

When they parted, a trail of saliva connected them just a second before it, too, snapped, and they were left panting, watching each other in a mixture of curiosity, awe, and lust.

Akechi settled in his lap and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. The kiss had been incredibly sloppy and inexperienced, but in it, he'd felt something he never had before.

Certain their kiss wasn't normal, Akira mimicked the same action, wiping his mouth with the back of his own hand. It wasn't his first kiss by any means, but there was something about it that set everything else apart. Like they were drawn together, destined, even, as if . . . they were soulmates. He'd never say anything like it aloud but, he couldn't ignore that the ache he felt in his chest wasn't lust; it was a longing unnamed that could be filled by only one person.

Akechi's left hand sank into Akira's right cheek, gripping his jaw, his thumb wiping gently across his bottom lip. Akira let Akechi explore, certain his own face held the same fascination that was present in Akechi's. The other's right hand went to his neck, fingertips pressing circles as Akira's own hands traveled from Akechi's knees up his thighs, the fabric of his pajama pants soft and warm from the other's body heat.

Being together with Akechi like this felt too natural, enough that its very familiarity was alarming.  They'd known each other no more than an hour, but to Akira, it felt like a lifetime, perhaps several lifetimes even.

Akechi's fingertips fell, and he pressed his palms and his weight against Akira's shoulders as he leaned in to whisper in his ear, breath hot and voice honey, "I want you to fuck me."

Akira's eyes went wide, but as Akechi began to kiss his neck, he tilted his head back to give him space. "That escalated quickly," he smiled.

"You would," he kissed him once, "make me," again, lower this time, wetter, too, "feel good, wouldn't you?" He sat up and Akira righted himself to meet the impassioned red eyes he was certain had cast magic.

"I would try." His blush didn't matter at this point, "I've never actually done that before."

"I haven't either," Akechi admitted, easily, "but I can tell . . . you would make me _feel_ something." When he looked down at Akira, his eyes half-lidded, incredibly fond, Akira came to the realization that that spell was getting stronger and he had nothing to protect himself from it.

"But you said--"

"It was never an order of my previous master," Akechi said quickly and then continued more slowly, "but he had demanded I be prepared in case it was useful in the spying and reconnaissance I did."

"Oh, that, good . . ." Akechi had begun to massage Akira's shoulders, loosening him up even more, and it made him lose his line of thought, "Not that forcing you to kill someone was any better."

Akechi leaned in and kissed him again, more gentle and less forceful than the first time, "Please use me, Akira."

Their kiss deepened, but before Akira lost himself inside it, he turned his head away. Akechi sat up again, watching, not hurt, but clearly concerned. "You're beautiful, and incredibly attractive, but . . ."

Now Akechi looked hurt. "What is it?"

Akira braced himself and took a deep breath to steel himself against the man he was sure he'd been missing all his life, "You're a human being, and I'm not going to use you in that way. Please don't say anything else self-depreciative."

"But, I want you to." Akechi didn't seem to understand what Akira was trying to say, "I may not live much longer, anyway, and besides, it would feel good to you, right?"

Akira shook his head, "I mean, that's not the point. You can't just offer your body because you think it's worth nothing."

"It _is_ worth something, which is why I'm offering it to _you_ ," Akechi put his hands over his face a moment, and Akira briefly wondered if he was going to cry, but instead of that, Akechi ran his fingers through his hair and spoke carefully, looking more and more like someone Akira had known or at least been searching for, all this time, "If I'm allowed to be, I feel so attracted to you. I don't know why, but I believe every word you say; you _will_ get me the revenge I seek, and you'll free me, too. Please . . . _please_."

Akira sat up quickly to meet Akechi's lips, and within a second, they were inseparable once more. This time, their hands began to travel, their mutual fascination taking hold and strangling them into submission to their lust. Akechi came alive, hungry in his attempts at furthering their intimacy, kissing and pressing, pulling and biting. Without warning, Akira's hands moved under his thighs, he pulled him up, and carried him to the bed, laying him out as Akechi continued to mark his neck.

Everything happened too quickly, but despite the inexperience and the pain, Akechi was soon reduced to begging as Akira pressed harder inside him.

It was in this position, in this moment, that Akira remembered, reality crashing down around him like it had too many times previously for it to shake him as much as it did. Trembling now, he pulled out of Akechi quickly, panting, wanting nothing more to continue but knowing better of it.

Akechi moved slowly, questions in his eyes that wouldn't spill from his lips. He studied Akira, clearly seeing he was still hard, still aroused, still in need, so he bowed his head and, taking his right hand in both of his, brought Akira's palm to his lips to kiss it gently.

Akira stared, speechless. This was Akechi, but it also wasn't Akechi. It was him, at his very core, but it was also one that had been broken in bondage.

"Goro?"

Akechi brought Akira's right hand to his neck, his red eyes dull with lust unfed. He pressed his hand into his throat, moving fingers so that Akira would need only squeeze to choke him. "If I've displeased you, you can kill me."

Akira pulled his hand away instantly, "Stop." He felt like he'd been slapped. No, no Akechi would never say that. Who was this? Who was he with? Who was this person wearing Akechi's face? How could someone be so broken? "I'm  . . . so sorry." Akira searched the other's eyes wildly, "Goro, are you there? Do you remember?"

On his knees in the sheets, Akechi sunk low, confused, "What? Why did you stop?"

"This is just a dream. This isn't real. I mean." No, that wasn't right, "You're real, and my desire, no, my _feelings_ for you are real, but this--"

Akechi tilted his head, nervous now due to Akira's behavior, "What are you talking about? Let's keep going." He moved to get closer again, an arm reaching out.

Akira pushed it away, "No, no, we should stop. I'm sorry." He shook his head, "You-you're so hot. This is something I wanted with you but, _not like this_. Please, just--"

Akechi didn't understand all of what Akira was getting at, but he did hear that this was something he wanted. Seeing no other option, he bent forward suddenly and took Akira into his mouth.

Akira froze, his mind going blank as Goro worked. He'd wanted this for so long--to be intimate with Goro, to be trusted by him, to be loved by him. They'd never gone this far before. Even if he was sure Akechi wanted something similar, an embrace or a kiss even, Akechi never reached for it, and every time Akira tried to give it to him, he was pushed away. But right now, Akechi was taking what he wanted, and he wasn't even leaving it to Akira to decide or even provide, himself.

Was this, deep down, something Akechi really wanted? Did their desires actually align? Did Akechi feel the way about him that he did for Akechi? Akira, in a daze, hadn't realized he was digging nails into Akechi's shoulders, spreading his legs shamelessly to give Akechi more room, panting his name along with a million things he'd never said as he moaned from the pleasure that coiled through his body. He didn't give Akechi a warning when he came, and, just as he imagined earlier, Goro pulled away and swallowed, cum mixed with saliva dripping out of the corner of his mouth and down his chin.

There was nothing more erotic than this, but the image was quickly overshadowed by the realization that hit him. He'd had sex with Akechi, and it wasn't even him, not really. It was like he'd done it without his consent, but, did it count if he'd come on to him? No, of course it did because _he_ was aware. He was aware and Goro wasn't. Goro had no idea . . . no idea that--

"I love you, Goro," he said suddenly, pulling him closer, into his lap to kiss him, "I love you, " he repeated, "God, you're so good."

Still a mess, Akechi smiled, genuine and euphoric from the praise, "Akira, I'm happy I belong to you." He kissed him again, saying softly, his voice taking on a pleading tone, "Don't get rid of me, please. Please don't sell me." Akira's eyes went wide, and he stopped responding to the kisses as it dawned on him. What he'd done. What he'd let happen. What he'd . . . stolen.

Akechi's voice became desperate now, "I promise I'll do anything for you. I'll be hard for you--anytime if that's what you want."

Akira turned away, refusing to look at him, his eyes still wide, his breath haggard.

Goro tried to turn him back around, hands reaching at anything to pull back, to pull closer, to pull down, but Akira pushed him away, still not looking at him. "I'll do anything," he continued, his voice breaking as his breath caught in his throat and he let out a sob, "Please keep me! I'll be anything you want me to be, so please-I--"

Akira kept pushing him away, more forceful each time as Akechi weakly came back with the same desperate hands, more begging, more compromising, more promises.

"I need you, Akira. I need you to love me, so if you need me to fuck you, I will. I'll do anything for you, so please don't leave me!" he begged between sobs, "Please don't let me go. Please, I need you. Akira, if I tell you that I love you, too, will you keep me?"

It wasn't until Akira grabbed him by the hair and slammed his head against the wall repeatedly that he shut up, but even then, as Akechi's blood spread in a permanent, brilliant red stain on the white sheets and his body rose and fell in vibrations of pain,  Akira could still hear him crying, begging pathetically to be kept and to be loved.

"I'm sorry," Akira said softly, his hand petting honey-colored hair gently, "I'll save you, Goro. I'll save you."


	7. Crosswalk

Under the humid summer sun of high noon, the child in the center of the Shibuya crossing didn’t seem to recognize the danger he was in. Instead, Goro did his best to replicate the image he saw in his head of the person he wanted to be in the sketchbook on the pavement in crayon. Tall, in white, with a red mask like the one he'd made out of cardboard currently tied around his head and resting up above his bangs at an angle, he'd fight evil with his ray gun and his saber because he was a hero. He'd be strong because he was a hero. He'd save people because he was a hero. He'd be liked by everyone because he was a hero. Goro kept coloring on the warm concrete, the pages of his sketchbook ripped from the binding coils and spread out around him. The crayons he was using decorated the asphalt like confetti, and his ray gun and sword lay haphazardly over his drawings. When he bent over his current drawing and tucked his feet beneath him to block the sun so he could see the picture better, the manacle connected to his left ankle moved with it, barely budging the iron ball at the end that kept him firmly rooted to the spot in the crosswalk coloring to keep himself busy since he had no option of being freed.

As he colored, he ignored the adults around him, and they did the same. None of them bumped into him or walked over his drawings, but neither did they look down to see him there in the middle of the street. He'd watched for a long time earlier, or at least, it had felt like hours, but they'd never looked down at him--not once. He was invisible, but not enough to be trampled. It made it worse. If they knew to walk around him, then they knew he was there; it meant that they were deliberately not looking at him.

They were ignoring him.

It was lonely.

But, at least he had his cape and his mask and his saber and his ray gun and his colors. He could be whoever he wanted to be, and he'd map out all of his adventures right there and then in his sketchbook.

"Hey, what are you drawing there?"

Akechi looked up, shocked. The man in glasses squatted down beside him, and as soon as Akechi realized what was happening, his whole face blossomed with joy, his shoulders tensing in anticipation while his fingers curled into his hands to become fists.

Someone was talking to him! Really! Someone noticed him and they actually wanted to talk to him? He was really lucky!

"Oh this?" his left hand pointed to the drawing but his eyes never left the stranger who had joined him, "It's me!"

The stranger went from squatting to sitting, folding his legs in and leaning forward slightly, "Oh, I see it now. Your mask and your cape."

"Yeah! I'm a superhero!" Goro exclaimed proudly, his red eyes alight with warmth.

The stranger gave a small smile, and Goro decided he liked it. It was good! He looked like a really friendly person when he smiled. He wondered if the stranger's smile had brought him lots of friends. Lucky. Goro would try to make him smile again. Maybe he could learn to look nicer.

"I'm also a prince!" Goro went on. He didn't want the stranger to become disinterested, so he'd need to prove to him that he was really cool and that the stranger had made a really good choice in deciding to talk to him.

"Wow," the stranger replied, not emphatically, but his smile was still there.

"And a detective!" Akechi added for good measure.

"That's impressive," the man replied. Goro decided he probably meant it; his eyes looked really serious even if he was smiling.

"Yeah. I have to work really hard," Akechi admitted. He looked back at what he'd been coloring and stared at his drawing, contemplating what to add to it, and then beginning to color again, "I'm Goro."

"Nice to meet you, Goro-kun," he replied politely. The child decided that the stranger had a good voice, too. It wasn't too adult-like, just almost adult-like. He was probably only an almost adult, not a real one. "Why is that? I mean, why do you have to work really hard?"

Akechi watched him a moment before looking for another color somewhere on the pavement, "So people want me."

The almost adult who hadn't yet said his name took the hair of his bangs between his fingers and rubbed them together. It made him look bored. It made Goro nervous, "What do you do as a superhero, prince, and detective?"

"I save children," Akechi replied with a confident smile, happy to talk about his adventures.

It made the stranger inch closer, stacking a few sketchbook pages together and putting away a few crayons so he could be closer to Akechi without destroying anything along the way. "Really? From what?"

"Bad adults," he said happily.

"Bad ones?" the stranger asked.

"Most adults," Goro clarified. It was true, though; most adults were bad.

"I see . . . How old are you Goro-kun?"

"How old are you?" Goro asked instead.

"Seventeen."

"I'm eight," he said quickly before putting down his crayon and grabbing his ray guy, "See my ray gun?" He held it in his palms so that the stranger could examine it.

"Yes," the stranger nodded.

"When you shoot it at people, they confess the bad things they did. It helps me solve crimes."

The stranger only nodded.

Akechi got nervous. Maybe the almost-adult would leave him? He didn't want that to happen! He grabbed his saber by the handle and held it across his chest like he'd seen in old western films, "And my saber. It kills only bad people!"

"Only bad ones?" the stranger questioned.

Akechi put his hand on the blade, "Yeah, see, it doesn't hurt me cause I'm not bad. If you're not bad, it won't hurt you." He was really proud of his saber. It was a really good tool! He hoped the stranger was impressed.

"Wow."

Akechi couldn't tell if that was the appropriate level of enthusiasm or not; maybe this person was just kind of boring. "Yeah, anyway, as a detective prince superhero, I'm usually pretty busy," he went on, "There are a lot of children with no family, so it's my job to find them one. And, if they're being hurt by bad adults, I take care of them. I help good adults, too, but there are not a lot of those, so I mostly just protect children from bad adults."

"That sounds like a lot of work, " said the stranger carefully. Akechi thought maybe he wanted to say more, but he didn't. He thought it was weird.

"It's okay," Goro said finally, going back to his drawing with a quick shrug.

"Why?"

Goro smiled as he colored thick, black lines, "Maybe if I get good at it, more people will like me."

The stranger pulled his knees in closer to his chest and put his arms around them, still watching Akechi as he colored, "That seems to be really important to you . . . acceptance from others."

"Acceptance?" Akechi asked, curious.

"That people like you for who you are," the stranger clarified.

"Yeah," Akechi agreed. He definitely wanted that.

"Why?"

Akechi tried to explain as he drew a creature with parasites erupting from its eyes. He was wrapped in black and white. Goro hadn't decided if he was a villain or an ally. "If you can’t get an acceptance, people don't like you, and if they don't like you, they leave you alone." The creature would be an ally. If he were a villain, he'd need a friend. Even villains had friends. But, just because someone was your ally, it didn't mean that they were also your friend.

"What do you mean?" the stranger asked, patient.

Akechi didn't look up, still coloring, "I mean if no one likes me, then I am alone. If no one wants me, then I'm alone." He put his drawing of Loki beside his drawing of Robin and picked up a black crayon again before looking at the man with the curly black hair and glasses, "I hate being alone."

"Have you tried making friends?" the man asked right away.

"Making friends?"

"You are a detective prince superhero to get people to like you," the stranger reviewed. "Have you ever tried just making friends? Friends like you for who you are, even if you aren't a detective prince superhero."

"They're acceptance." Goro tried.

The stranger smiled, "They show acceptance, yes."

"I don't have any friends," Goro said with another shrug before going back to his drawing of a white wall with red letters.

"Why?"

"I'm cursed," he replied easily. It was just the way things were. The stranger was probably going to leave soon anyway. Again, his saber was pretty cool. and he hadn't seemed that impressed, so he probably wasn't going to be interested in anything else Goro had to offer.

"Cursed?"

"So I'm not allowed to have any friends," Akechi tried to explain. "I can't." He could still have people like him, sure, but that was different from having friends.

"What do you mean that you're cursed?" This time, the stranger ran a hand through his hair like he was annoyed or feeling impatient. Goro was sure he would leave soon. It was for the best.

Goro kept coloring in wide, quick strokes, "Anyone who gets close to me dies. All of the people I like die. I make people die." The wide strokes on his paper became scribbles, and soon, the paper was nothing but a red mess of wax.

The almost adult shook his head, but Goro kept going, "It's because I'm cursed. Don't worry. You're fine. You're just a stranger. I don't even know your name."

"I see." The stranger didn't offer it. "How long have you been cursed?" he asked instead.

"All of my life," Goro opened the sketchbook to a new page. When the stranger said nothing else but didn't move to leave, Akechi gathered that he was supposed to keep talking. "I made my mom die. I made Saeki-sensei die. I made Akira-kun die." Akechi didn't look at the stranger. He didn't really want to talk about it, but he didn't want the stranger to go because then he'd be alone again. The stranger was probably only staying because of the conversation about his curse, so he just had to be strong and keep talking about it.

"Akira-kun?" the stranger asked, curious.

Akechi wasn't sure why the almost adult would ask about Akira specifically, but oh well. He was still there, so he would keep talking. "He was my rival; he did a lot of good stuff, but I made him die cause he was in Papa's way."

"I see."

Akechi was glad he didn't sound shocked or angry, "I didn't really want to; I wanted to be his friend. That's probably why he died. I shouldn't wish for friends."

"How did he die?"

Goro shrugged, his paper now displaying a woman who appeared to be hanging from a ceiling by a rope, a crudely drawn smile with too many teeth and red where it didn't belong. "Papa trapped him in a box."

"In a box?" the stranger was staring, and Goro noticed, so he ripped out the page and set it aside to draw something else.

"Yeah, so he couldn't get out. He starved and died. I should have died instead. I wanted to stop Papa, but I'm weak. Still, I should have tried. I should have died instead of Akira-kun." A figure in black with a white mask and red hands had now been scribbled onto the page.

"It's in the past now," the stranger said.

"Yeah,” Akechi agreed, staring at his drawing and tilting his head before setting the black crayon down again to pick up the red once more.

“May I be your friend?”

Goro looked up, confused, “No.” Hadn't he just explained this? What a weird person.

“May I color with you, even if I’m not your friend?”

Akechi thought about it only briefly, “I guess.” Someone could color you and not be your friend. He opened up the other half of the sketchbook so that the stranger had something to color on. Without hesitation, the stranger picked up the brown crayon and began to draw a boy with shoulder length hair.

"Goro, I don't think you're cursed."

Goro said nothing. After all, that was just the stranger's idea. He didn't know. He hadn't lived his life. He didn't know what he'd been through. He didn't know the bad things he'd done. He wasn't deserving of anything; he hurt all of the people who liked him . . . all of the people who showed him acceptance.

"There is so much you can't control, you know?" the stranger said softly, his voice sounding more like a whisper. Goro didn't understand why he was speaking more quietly, but he kind of liked it, or maybe he would have liked it if he were trying to sleep. "It's not always about you-- about what you can or can't do. Sometimes, it's about the other person or it's about a system in society, or it's about the way the world is."

Goro stopped coloring and watched the image of a man, a defender of justice, with short brown hair, a red cape, and a white costume, form on the almost adult's paper slowly. "I don't really understand." The way the world was? That didn't seem very fair. He thought that if he tried his best, he could change things. He thought, if he figured out what to do, then he'd be able to protect himself and other people, too. He just had to figure it out, and when he did, then at least he could make a difference around him. Akechi was still staring at the drawing the man had made as the subject of the piece actually dawned on him.

" _You_ aren't what's wrong, Goro; it's the world that's wrong."

"The world?" He asked, seeing now that the image of the defender of justice in the red cape and white gloves was actually him. But, what good was a defender of justice if justice couldn't win against the world?

"Yeah."

He couldn't look away. It was such a nice drawing; the stranger was such an artist! He looked like a real hero. He looked nothing like what he did now. "Not me?" If he wasn't what was wrong, and it was the world that was wrong, then what good was he at all? He was just a kid! How could he change anything?! And, if he wasn't cursed, then why did the people he loved die?! Why did they leave him alone? Why was he alone?!

"That's right."

"The wo-" Akechi never finished the sentence, the child's remains spread from where he'd just been sitting to the other side of the crossing, muscle, skin, and splattered blood coloring the front end of the truck that had hit him. The remains of his body lay in a heap in the otherwise empty street, limbs that had not been torn now bending backward in impossible positions. The ball and chain sunk beside the body splattered wet and red a reminder of how, even in death, he would be shackled to the whims of a world he held no control over.

Akira sat back, removing the blood-stained glasses from his eyes, shaking slightly and still in shock. He looked away and saw the sketchbook pages scattered around him.

Goro's adventure would have to come to an end for now. Though, it wasn't really his adventure to enjoy anyway.

The world was pain, and he existed inside it; it did not exist solely in him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Life hits you hard. But it takes you three seconds to decide if you are a superhero or not. I am." - Hrithik Roshan 
> 
> Are you?
> 
> I fell asleep three nights in a row with my computer on my lap. T- T


	8. Sepulchre

When Akechi woke up, darkness introduced claustrophobia. Opposite to the world of infinite white with the wall painted red, this dream suggested that there was nothing to explore, to see, to touch, to feel. The space around him was not empty, but full, and though nothing reached for him, he felt certain that the imprisonment he had found himself in enveloped him so tightly that moving at all presented a risk he was too scared of the consequences to take.

So, he waited. Some familiar sounds would present themselves and leave a clue to his whereabouts. Some distinct smell would find his nostrils to allude to his surroundings. And, maybe, if he were incredibly lucky, an ally might find and retrieve him, shedding light on whatever misfortune he had found himself in.

He laughed.

The last option was impossible. He was not one for luck or allies, and the only person to ever save him had always only been himself.

The laughter helped, however, for when it pushed its way out his mouth, it fell flat in the space around him. There was no echo. It could mean one of two things: he was in a small space or he was in a space that was as infinite as the dream with the single wall. A starting point had been established now; he was too scared to move, but he could speak.

A single name fought its way out from behind his teeth, "Akira?" His voice small, and the name desperate, the single word sounded like a plea from a dying man.

At this point, Akechi wasn't sure if such an analogy was accurate. What would be better? To be alone, free from the person who had seen you at a point so low that you'd never even thought it possible for you? A person who had watched you die now on more than one occasion? A person who had beat you into submission last you spoke until you were bleeding out on starched white hotel sheets? A person who had, despite knowing you were not in your right mind, had sex with you?

Or, was it better to sit alone in the unchanging pressure of darkness unknown?

Akechi Goro. Alive or Dead?

He turned suddenly to his side and vomited onto the floor, his hands bracing his body from the impact as it heaved from the purge of stomach acid and water. He could remember the impact of the truck. He could remember the pull of a hand in his hair. He could remember his mouth around a master who knew he was broken but chose only to break him further, grind him to dust, beat him bloody until there was nothing left.

Dead. Most certainly, dead.

The floor was cold but smooth, perhaps a marble of some sort-- certainly stone. Perhaps this was a tomb? He had finally been laid to rest. The thought outweighed the putrid smell of puke that now floated around him as he sat up. It meant his body hadn't been found or he'd run out of time. He wouldn't pretend to know how matters of the afterlife worked. He never believed in all of that anyway.

You live. You grow old. You die.

If you're lucky, you are loved somewhere along the way.

Case and point; he'd never been lucky--nevermind that he knew he'd never live long enough to see himself as _old_.

The feelings Akira appeared to harbor for him had never been brought to light until recently, until after his death. What good were they? Maybe Akira had realized the futility of them as well, and that's why he'd . . . that's why he'd . . . given up?

Goro shut his eyes and then opened them again; it was impossible to distinguish between the two lines of sight.

He held his breath, and the first sound produced not by him but by some other unseen force finally found its way to his ears. A drop. Stupidly reliant on sight in an environment in which he had none, his eyes went wide and alert. Of course, there was nothing to see. He listened, still holding his breath, the idea that if he were dead he would not need to breathe never quite hitting him until now.

Again.

He exhaled in a rush and gasped, breath caught; he practiced breathing again until it returned to normal, and then he reached a hand out, knuckles first for fear he'd lose his fingers, and felt the empty space. When there was nothing, he slowly brought his hand to the cold, marble floor, and crawled forward if it still felt familiar. Akechi continued the process, moving away now from the vomit and inching closer to the steady drip. He paused, now closer, to try to discern both the sound and the new smell.

A tiny splash.

Metallic.

Familiar.

Blood.

"Akira?"

The only logical answer slipped from his lips, and though it sounded not unlike the first time he'd said it, he wasn't sure what exactly he was pleading for at this point. No one else had been a player in the endless loop he had found himself caught in. No one else had contributed to the cycle of lives that he'd found himself trapped in. No one else had been tied with him so tightly that he'd been left with the fear of fate and the hope of destiny.

Akechi kept inching closer to the sound, never quickening his pace, too scared of the inevitability that was lying in wait for him. Hours passed in the time that it took to reach the source of sound, and when he did, death greeted him in full force, a smell so sudden and rancid that he was left in shock for several minutes as it washed over him. A rancid odor he'd come across only a few times, despite his line of work, told him he was actually alone, and this was a crypt inscribed with his own name. This time, when he reached out, knuckles first, he felt cold stone. His hand unfurled and his fingers traced it thoughtfully in timid fascination until they reached up and felt the top. Wet. His right hand reached out. Wet.

He pulled himself up. He did not have to see to know that a rotting corpse lay in front of him. Was it his own? He was the dead one after all. And, even in these nightmares, he was always the dead one. He belonged here in this mausoleum. That's why he'd woken up here, right?

Reaching a shaking hand forward, he felt to his left, where he expected his head to be.

Cold. The body.

Not him.

No.

He shivered.

He was cold, too.

The fingers of his left hand, shaking still, traced downward over the curve of the lips to the chin, down still to the neck, and--

As if touching a flame, Goro pulled his hand back, forming it immediately into a fist against his chest.

The neck had stopped. His body stopped at the neck. There was empty space where the rest of his body should have been. Shaking uncontrollably now, his right hand reached out in front of him and slowly came down to feel the slab of marble for the rest of himself.

Fabric, a stiff arm, immoveable fingers.

His head had been severed from his body.

Without thinking, he reached both hands out towards his head, weighty and wet with decomposition. In the darkness, he picked it up easily, a soundless confirmation that indeed nothing kept his identity tied to the rest of his lifeless corpse.

He held the head in front of him, unable to look down at it in the darkness, but trying desperately to see it anyway. Was this his acceptance of death? Was he ready to move on now? Was this something he was meant to experience?

A loud sound split the room in two, and it reached him before the light did.

A door had been opened.

The light washed over the weight in his hands to reveal the lifeless face of Kurusu Akira. His pale skin washed nearly ashen with the loss of blood, his lips dull, but parted, tiny fleas flying from it with a single one creeping from his mouth, cheeks sunken in, eyes thankfully closed but disfigured, far less present than they should have been, curly black hair half there, half fallen out. He'd been dead for some time, but the blood was still impossibly dripping from the severed head onto Goro's bare feet.

"You did well, my son."

He didn't scream. He didn't throw Akira's severed head to the floor. He didn't lunge at his father in a feral rage.

"Shido?" In Shido's presence, all he knew was restraint, and his instincts for self-preservation kicked in in full force. He was a mouse, a clever one, but small, impossibly powerless without the aid of the metaverse and his persona. He didn't look away from Akira; a part of him was still too scared.

"This world is mine now," Shido said with a smile.Akechi looked up and was left grateful he could not see the man's satisfaction what with the blinding light that surrounded him.

"No."

Akechi had whispered it too soft to reach the ears of a madman who heard only the blind acceptance and praise of his followers.

"Come, it's time you execute the rest of them."

His shadow left Akechi alone with the corpse of Kurusu Akira now in full view with the light from the sun outside sweeping into the tomb that belonged not to him, but to the Trickster who was meant to save the world.

Akechi had always thought Akira beautiful.

"No. No. No. No."

He squeezed the head in his hands, his vision beginning to blur from the tears in his eyes.

"No! No! No!"

He threw the severed head to the ground, and, unexpectedly, it stuck, broken and crushed like a squashed pumpkin, pus and congealed blood splattering as more putrid gas released from the impact.

Akechi stared, wide-eyed, at what he'd done.

"Wake up," he threatened.

Crumbling, shriveling, falling, inside himself, he stared down at what'd done to the one person who'd wanted something better for him.

"No, wake up."

He'd killed, _decapitated_ , the one person who'd known him and still looked at him with love.

"Wake up!"

Kurusu Akira was a swollen and misshapen corpse rotting away in a grave after he had reached out to help the fallen detective prince.

"Wake up! Wake Up! Wake up!"

But it was him who was dead; he was the one that was supposed to have died.

"Wake up."

He was the one who deserved to die.

"Please."

He was the one who should have been killed.

"Yes."

Akira should have been holding _his_ head, screaming at _his_ corpse, triumphantly laying _him_ to rest, so that nothing stood in his way of removing Shido.

"Yes. Yes! Yes!"

Akira should have lived.

"Yes!"

Akira should have won.

"Yes!"

Akira.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> /ugh I'm starting to have trouble writing on topic because these chapters are becoming interconnected  
> /the more aware I am of an overarching story-line, the more difficult it is to write quickly  
> I'm sorry it's starting to take more time. OTL


	9. Beach

Akira had finally managed to find a moment to himself. With the sun still high in the sky and the beach littered with tourists, he kept walking along the shoreline until the people scattered and the noise died down to little more than the ocean waves. He'd found himself in an area of the beach that was more-so reserved for surfing. He was about to continue on until he ended up on a new side of the island when he noticed a familiar face, brown eyes, and honey-colored hair.

"Akechi?"

Wearing a blue shirt over black swim trunks, the detective looked up as Akira got closer. "Oh, it's you," and he stood up, brushing sand absently off himself as his flip-flops found a flat surface in the beach beside a curious hermit crab. It was criminal how effortless Akechi made keeping sand from between his toes look.

"I'm beginning to get the idea that you're not actually a stalker but a paid PI." His surprise didn't show, covered instead by a poor joke. After he'd met Yusuke there, he shouldn't have been too surprised that anything like this could happen, but still, Akechi didn't go to either of their schools and yet here he was, six-thousand or more miles away from Japan, and, under different circumstances, on the same beach as Akira.

It felt like too much of a coincidence, but a lot of their experiences felt that way, so it wasn't entirely out of the ordinary if one was speaking in terms of their extraordinary relationship.

"You found me, so are you sure it isn't the other way around?"

"I'm not the one with credentials, and besides, I also came with more than a hundred other people sooo . . . " Akira wanted to point out the other's disbelief that was clear in his reluctance to talk, but instead, he gave a lazy smile and wiped the sweat from the back of his neck, trying to play casual, "School trip, Akechi-kun?"

Akechi smiled pleasantly, enough that the sunlight that bounced off of his bleach white teeth would have blinded Akira had he not been wearing sunglasses. "I came to do a special interview, actually, which was really surprising given my fall in popularity. It was this morning. I have to go back tomorrow."

"You came to Hawaii for two days?" Akira asked, skeptically, "Quite the globetrotter."

"I would never have been able to visit otherwise," Akechi shrugged. "Honestly, it was my first trip out of the country, so it was welcomed."

Akira nodded, "I was pretty surprised Shujin brought us to Hawaii. I'm not used to private schools and the frivolous way they treat money."

"Am I detecting a complaint?"

Akira smiled, "No, it's not that. It's just, they sent us all here, but it is entirely disorganized."

"So you'd prefer to not have free time on the beach?"

"No." Akira frowned, used to Akechi putting words in his mouth but still not caring too much for it. The guy was aggressive in all of the wrong ways.

"You're not with your friends."

That sounded like an accusation, but Akira couldn't even place what for. "I wanted some time alone," he replied casually, holding back the urge to also mention that he had no interest in being interrogated either.

"Oh, my apologies. I'll--"

"Wait, Akechi-kun., His casual reply must have sounded more like a direct attack because Akechi had turned to start walking away from the beach entirely. That had gone south way too fast. He was still figuring Akechi out anyway; his visits to Leblanc were too infrequent and their conversations throughout Tokyo were always too brief.

"Yes?" Akechi turned back around, but only because Akira had forced him into it, a hand on the other's shoulder but barely touching. From Akechi's forced expression, he may as well have grabbed him by the hair.

He decided not to notice that, however, because something else was weighing on his mind, "You always do that."

"Do what?"

"Leave."

The sun must have baked his brain right through his skull. They weren't even in Leblanc and he was practically calling ' _bullshit_ ' on Akechi, which, aside from intuition and speculation, didn't have much evidence.

"I'm afraid I don't know what you're referring to."

Right, he needed a new approach. How to keep a cute guy who was kind of an asshole but refreshingly clever around for a heated summer evening on the beach? "Be my date for the night?"

"Excuse me?" Akechi blinked and nearly scowled until a millisecond into it, he remembered how their conversations usually went and that Akira was probably not being serious.

Oh, was that too direct? Akira decided to take the 'destiny' angle; Akechi seemed like someone who wouldn't be into it, but anything was worth a try, "We met each other nearly seven thousand kilometers from home. That has to count for something."

And then, the upperclassman actually blushed, "Kurusu, you're being serious?"

"Hm? That I want to hang out with you? Well, yeah." Apparently, the detective prince was all about the 'destiny' angle. He hadn't even named fate or that their meeting was foreordained or something, and he was red in the face. He played down the joke, almost feeling bad.

"And not your friends?"

"Not particularly," Akira shrugged. He spent a lot of time with them, but this meeting did feel like some kind of rare opportunity. He looked out to the horizon behind him to see where the sun was currently nestled among some clouds. They probably had enough time to eat and relax a bit before he had to make curfew at the hotel-- a few hours at least. When he turned back around, he aught Akechi's bewildered expression, "Akechi, what's weird about that?"

"Most people don't really . . . nevermind." He opened and closed his hands as if they were cramping and then put them down at his sides as if he'd done something wrong and needed them to put them away where they couldn't get him into trouble. "Okay, that's fine. I'll spend the evening with you. What were you doing before?"

"Oh, just walking." It didn't sound promising, but it meant that they could hold a conversation for perhaps more than all of seven minutes. So, in Akira's book, that was a win; he had to count his victories with the detective where he could. "Are you hungry?"

"I could eat."

Akira noted how incredibly noncommital he was, but offered anyway, "There was a food stall for garlic shrimp. Have you had it?"

"No."

"Let's get some. My treat."

They walked back to the beach by the hotel together without talking for a bit until Goro suddenly spoke, full TV persona on and glittering. "So, have you been enjoying your stay? I admit that Hawaii feels more like Japan than I imagined; there is such a large Japanese population here."

"It's been okay . . ." Akira trailed off. The sudden and forced conversation, accompanied by the pleasant lilt and polite enthusiasm in Akechi's tone would have offended anyone not expecting it.

Akechi didn't appear to notice the less than enthusiastic response of his one-man audience and just kept talking, "Did you know that the first Japanese who went to Hawaii were in search of heaven on Earth? Calling it ' _Tenjiku_ ', they thought that the islands would be home to perfect weather and endless riches."

"You don't have to do that," Akira supplied.

"Do what?" Akechi played innocence like a natural.

"Force yourself to talk."

A short rush of air from his mouth signaled his displeasure, which helped Akira decipher his true emotions because he was, of course, still smiling, "I'm not forcing myself. I'm just making conversation."

Yeah, forced conversation. Akira watched the wind in the palm trees blow their branches this way and that and silently appreciated the warmth of the climate despite the breeze. "Okay, then instead of telling me about Hawaii, tell me instead about yourself."

"Myself?"

Why did the TV idol look so genuinely surprised? "Yeah," Akira confirmed, but then immediately offered a way out, "Or you could even just tell me what's on your mind."

Akira's words had barely left his mouth when Akechi replied automatically, "The Phantom Thieves."

That made sense. "Understandable."

"And you," Akechi added with the same easy tone of voice.

Akira didn't even try to hide his smile, "Glad to hear it."

"I don't understand you," Akechi went on, admitting something that perhaps, he shouldn't have.

Akira shrugged, "You're overthinking things." He was a trickster so good at his game he'd forgotten he was even playing it.

"Am I?" Akechi stopped when he saw the garlic shrimp, and when he did, the water rushed into the shore to lap at his feet, the waves pleasant but loud.

Akira stopped, too, turning towards him to see him outlined in the dimming orange of a sunset. He didn't even take a moment to realize that here in this country, Akechi was just another tourist among an ocean of tourists-- a foreigner with a pretty face but nothing more. He wondered if it would change when he showed up on the television show that Akechi had interviewed for.

"Probably?" Akira looked at the sand beneath his feet and noticed that Akechi's toes were now covered in sand. Perhaps he had led him astray. He looked up again, this time into Akechi's eyes, and he couldn't help but notice that the colors in them were competing with the fading colors of the day. "What is it you don't understand? Or, what do you want to know?" He realized he'd never seen Akechi posed in front of a natural backdrop of ocean and sky. He'd never seen him not surrounded by the lights and noise of Tokyo. How unfair; he looked effortless even here, like a natural part of the scenery that had grown into the surroundings long ago.

"Why people are drawn to you?" Akechi took his detective pose, an elbow in his palm and a hand to his chin. It broke the illusion, but Akira didn't let it show.

"Oh, that's easy. It's because I'm a good listener." Akira didn't even have to think about answering the question. The way he saw it, people enjoyed hearing themselves talk.

"What?" Akechi looked taken aback, his round eyes wider than necessary for something so trite.

Akira shrugged, not understanding Akechi's surprise. Did he not see the connection they had? Even before what they'd recently built up, he knew Akechi must have felt the strings pulling them closer. "It has nothing at all to do with my personality." And then, the beach began to empty slowly, one or two at a time, the people vanished, leaving the sand around them untouched and clean as if they'd never been standing there a second prior. Akira continued speaking as though nothing were amiss, the squawking of the seagulls making up for the sudden silence from the tourists that had literally disappeared into thin air. "I just listen and tell people what they need to hear, sometimes not even that, and they just . . . trust me. I'm good at being empathetic . . . or at least, pretending to be." Empty.

In the silence that held weight between them, their eyes locked on one another's, the scene around them cleaned completely of other souls until, quite suddenly, aside from the man selling shrimp, they were the only two people on the beach.

Akechi had seen the phenomenon, but he chose not to comment on it for the sake of their present conversation, "Surely there is more to it than that." And maybe there wasn't, but Akechi spoke more out of an effort to keep up the guise that Akira had little in common with him. Opposites attract. If Akira and he were like-minded, where would there be a saving grace? How would they reach some sort of equilibrium?

Everything suddenly felt off. Akira recognized the feeling associated with nightmares, dreamscapes, the cognitive world where the only limits were one's imagination . . . but he didn't want to verbalize it in an attempt to pretend this, yet again, was still some other reality-- a reality where he was able to have a sunny beach date with Goro Akechi-- a reality that would never come to pass. "Not really."

"Well, who listens to you then?"

Akira tried to read Goro's body language, the way his eyes started to shift, the way he leaned his weight onto one leg rather than remain balanced. Had he sensed it, too? Akira digested the question, letting the past settle in the pit of his stomach. He was looking right at Akechi when he spoke, but he wasn't really seeing him. Instead, he was replaying how easy relationships had been during his life in Tokyo-- all with the exception of one.

"No one."

"What?"

Akira looked behind him to follow Akechi's line of sight and then looked back around to face him. He noticed that even the area past the beach had been emptied. Oahu was now a population of three.

Goro couldn't choose the right expression to wear, "That can't be true."

"Why not?" Akira didn't look away from the sunset or Akechi; he kept his eyes on what mattered. There was nothing else here of any consequence. The dream was meant for them alone.

Akechi grabbed at straws and drew the short end of the argument, "You sound like you're not giving yourself enough credit."

That didn't sound honest, but Akira moved on, "No, it's nothing like that."

"I'll admit, when I first met you, I thought you were incredibly boring, average, even, but--I don't see you that way anymore."

"What changed?" Akira asked, honestly interested. Akechi didn't appear to be in peak performance, but Akira couldn't tell if it was because of their shared dream or something else.

"I found out who you were."

"Who I am?"

"The leader of the Phantom Thieves."

Akira didn't understand this reality, but he let Akechi spell it out for him.

"Joker, is it?" Akechi smirked but he still seemed off like he was experiencing two realities at once and it left him in pieces, "It wasn't just that, though. You're also so contradictory. Like me. But, people like you."

"People like you," Akira said slowly, the reality he was experiencing too fragmented. Akechi didn't seem to care that the people around them had vanished and the beach had been emptied, but he also was saying things that didn't make sense. If they had met on the beach back in September, Akechi never would have revealed his cards as he was now; he would never have admitted to knowing anything.

Akechi sighed, "No, I have followers, not friends."

"I'm your friend," Akira countered a little too eagerly. Hadn't he proved that? Hadn't their bond been growing? Now, in these dreams, of course, but back then, too, in the reality that Goro no longer belonged to.

"That, too. Where do you get off thinking we're friends?" Akechi's tone was sharp, and it pulled Akira out of his reverie.

Unsure of whether to break the spell or keep it going, he attempted to argue while still remaining vague, "Well, we've confided in one another. We've trusted one another. We've made each other better people."

Akira knew it had been the wrong choice of words because Akechi's rust-colored eyes narrowed, "What?"

Akira immediately waved it off and turned around, "You're right; I'm getting ahead of myself. Garlic shrimp?"

The distraction appeared to work because Akechi followed him, and after Akira ordered garlic shrimp in broken English, the two of them found a nearby bench and ate in silence. Alone together, it allowed for them to take in the natural beauty of the beach, the calm serenity of the steady tide, the birds in the horizon and even the curious crab here and there skittering across the sand. He couldn't remember enjoying it back then when he'd actually visited. He'd never had the time to simply take in his surroundings.

"It's very good. Thank you," Akechi finished his food and threw it away in a trash can nearby. "Your English isn't terrible," he complimented when he returned, "you ordered food with relative ease."

Akira smiled, still confused about the reality they were in, but appreciating the opportunity to see more of Akechi's honesty, "No, but it could be better. You did an interview here, so you must have an advanced level of understanding." Akira threw away his own trash.

"I'm not bad at it," Akechi said with a smile, his eyes on the sunset that was now mirroring the ocean in color, deep blues and purples as the sun sank lower into the sea.

"Modestly doesn't look right on you," Akira followed his line of sight and began to walk towards the ocean, hoping Akechi would follow after him.

He did. "Tell me more, Kurusu."

"Sarcasm does," Akira smiled back at him.

Akechi scoffed, "Are you flirting with me?"

"Yes," Akira grinned, choosing to wiggle his eyebrows as well which only made the detective roll his eyes.

Akechi shook his head, his eyes dull in the fading light, "You just enjoy living dangerously."

"I do enjoy that, but I also enjoy you," he admitted, enjoying the company of Akechi, and only Akechi, on the beach in Oahu. Even the man selling garlic shrimp had disappeared, the stall he'd been selling out of having literally vanished. They were, in this reality, truly alone.

Goro laughed awkwardly clearly caught between accepting Akira's response as genuine or just another attempt to get a rise out of him, "Wow, Kurusu."

With the warm ocean water at their feet, Akira sat down in the sand, his legs outstretched in front of him, "I'm glad I found you."

Akechi joined him, the silence between them comfortable before he finally responded, "I'm happy I was found."

"Stay with me?" The sun had disappeared. The sky was going dark.

"Hmm?"

"Tell me you'll stay."

Neither of them looked at one another, listening instead to the waves and watching the sky fade from twilight to night without a single star in the sky. Akira realized only then that there weren't even any animals left-- no birds, no crabs, no life left beyond the two of them. "Sure. You're pleasant company."

"I'm glad."

"Despite everything," Akechi added, his legs bent against his chest and his arms wrapped around his knees.

Akira didn't say anything; he understood what Akechi meant. The spell had been broken. He didn't know what the trigger had been or when Akechi had remembered, but here they were, again, in a nightmare of their own creation. For what felt like the hundredth time, he wished it could have remained a sweet dream.

"Kurusu, did you ever consider me a Phantom Thief?" Goro asked after the sky had gone black, the lights of the city behind them a soft glow and the moon above a single beacon.

It was Akira's turn to admit defeat. "No," he admitted quietly, "I wanted to, but . . . If I ever truly did, then the desire to see you that way would have disappeared." He watched Akechi on his left. His right hand had sunk into the sand, his fingers spread out before he began to trace figure '8's in the sand.

"This feels so real." The figure '8's became circles before the tracing stopped, and to Akira's surprise, Akechi leaned against him, his head falling on his shoulder, his right cheek soft against his bare skin. "Kurusu, I think you're sick," he whispered.

"What? Why?" Akira asked, not moving for fear that Akechi would pull away.

"I'm only a ghost. A fragment of a memory. And all of this . . . it's hard to remember what's real. . . . Tell me . . . what's going on out there?"

"Out there?"

"You know what I mean," Akechi whispered, sounding uncharacteristically nervous.

"Were you a virgin when you died?"

Akechi righted himself so fast he nearly fell over to his left side, "Not important!" He was blushing when Akira looked over and covering his mouth as he spoke, but it didn't help in the least to hide his embarrassment. "Where did that come from?"

Akira smiled slowly, Akechi's reaction evidence enough, and that was when the sound of the waves silenced. The branches of the palm trees continued to wave in the breeze, but could not be heard. With world suddenly on mute, the reality around them suffocated their senses.

Akira moved to his side to face Goro more directly, his weight shifting in the sand, but even the grains were silent as they ground together. "I just . . . had the opportunity to spend that evening in Hawaii with anyone, but I, for some reason, had thought of you back then. I wanted to ask you if you had ever seen a sunset like that. If you liked garlic shrimp. If you preferred Japanese pancakes to American pancakes. What you thought of the ocean. Stupid shit."

"Stupid shit?"

Akira didn't understand the fear on Goro's face.

"I wanted all of that stupid shit with you."

The waves froze, the branches of the palm trees, fixed. The world went still. Caught in a single moment, time on pause, Akira focused on Akechi's form under the moonlight and nothing else. When Goro said nothing with an expression that spoke of silent, obedient fear, Akira reached out to touch his face, fingertips gentle, careful, and warm, "Watch the sunset with me?"

Akechi's eyes never left his, his words free of emotion, "What choice do I have?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure what happened, sorry. OTL


	10. Unfamiliar Ceiling 2

"Karoi-sensei!"

"Ren?" A woman with short, wavy brown hair opened the door, an expression somewhere between annoyance and surprise on her face. "How many times do I have to tell you not to call me sensei? We're practically the same age. It's weird." She opened the door wider to let them in, not saying a word about Goro as if she had missed him completely.

Goro noticed first, before anything else, the glowing ring over her head. She was a haibane, too, then. She looked only slightly older than Ren did. He wondered how many other haibane were adults or even how many there were at all. As he followed Ren inside, he noticed the easy banter they shot back and forth; they were clearly close, but it wasn't the same tone he'd used with him earlier that morning.

"But you're our teacher, so it only makes sense."

"You don't attend my class!" She was in front of the very mirror Ren had mentioned earlier that morning--the whole reason they had come. She was fixing her hair and buttoning a simple rose pink cardigan over a plain faded green, pleated dress that had faded seams and fraying hems.

"But you're always teaching me life lessons," Ren replied, his eyes smiling as he took Goro's wrist and pulled him forward and in front of him as if presenting a child to an adult.

"Ren-oh, oh, you must be the new haibane," she twirled around, smiling suddenly, her tone of voice far more kind than what she'd just been using towards Ren.

"Pleased to meet you," Goro felt himself blush as Karoi examined him with her brown eyes dark and serious as she looked him over and inspected his wings while her touch gentle as she smoothed his feathers.

"Wow, you're so handsome," and the blush that appeared on her cheeks made Goro's blush only deepen more. Instead of greeting him with a handshake or even a hug, she took both his hands in hers and closed them together, smiling at him with an instant fondness Goro couldn't place, "I'm Karoi, nice to meet you."

"Goro," he finally said, their hands still clasped together and his eyes trapped in hers.

"Goro? What? Really, like thunder?" she laughed and let him go, her attention still on him even as she tried to press flat the few pleats in the skirt of her dress.

Goro blushed even more deeply, "That's right."

She waved his uneasiness away with a hand and words of comfort he wasn't sure of what to do with, "Oh, don't be so shy. We're practically old by Haibane standards, so think nothing of it. Speaking of which, we should close shop early today and celebrate."

"Don't overwhelm him, sensei."

She turned to Ren, suddenly snippy once more, "Ren, stop that. I'm showing him a warm welcome!" She looked back to the brunette, "Would it be too much, Goro? What if it were just the five of us? You're going to have to meet the family at some point."

He had no idea what that meant. But, if five was the fewest number of people, then he figured that was what would be best. He couldn't remember if he liked being around people or not, but he preferred to find things out slowly, that much was certain. Still, she genuinely appeared to want what was best, and she was close to Ren, so it couldn't be that bad. "That sounds better?"

She looked back to Ren, brown eyes narrowed, "Has he not met Sae, yet?"

"No," Ren tried to look innocent.

Karoi sighed, clearly displeased, but she let it pass when she spoke once more to Goro, hands on his shoulders, "Ah, well, there are two other old feathers; they work further into town. They’re typically home late, so we can have a drink with them then. You like cider, Goro?"

"I don't know?" he blinked.

She let him go, laughing lightly, "Right. We'll find out tonight! I have to go get the kids."

“Good luck today, sensei!” Ren called after she did a final adjustment to her cardigan and took off out the door.

“Enough of you!” she yelled from down the hallway.

"She loves me," Ren smiled.

That much was obvious, though Goro couldn't tell what kind of love it was. Despite her tone, everything she'd said towards Ren had been laced with affection. Even when she seemed upset, she appeared overjoyed to see him in her company.

Meet the family?

"You two must be very close." The fact that she'd left them in her room without a second thought was also very telling.

"Yeah, she found me a few years ago. There aren't a lot of us old feathers, so we sort of stick pretty close together," Ren began to pick up around her room, tossing dirty laundry into a small basket, discarding a few pieces of trash, stacking cups, etc.

Goro hadn't heard the last part or even taken notice of Ren's behavior because he had moved in front of the full-length mirror in her room. Standing in front of it, he looked into his eyes first. They were a dull red, rust color, almost inhuman in their clarity. Goro couldn't remember if his eyes had always been this color or if they were new, but he could recognize enough that they were unique. From there, he looked at his face- a tight jaw, a flawless complexion, a rounded nose, a wide forehead, amber colored hair that looked more like a honey brown than a true brown. He touched his face, leaning in closer to examine the shape, the color, the way his eyebrows moved when his eyes opened wide. His hair was messy with uneven bangs and layers that ended at his shoulders. He tucked it behind his ears and realized how feminine he looked. He hadn't expected it-- not that he exactly had expectations, but, he certainly hadn't seen it coming. He was objectively attractive, so at least he had that going for him if nothing else. Karoi had called him handsome. One of the kids had called him pretty. What did Ren think?

He straightened up to see the small, charcoal gray wings sprouting from his back, and that's when he realized it, “Your clothes don’t actually fit me.” Too tight.

“Well, it’s not perfect ‘no’,” Ren admitted.

Goro frowned, his lips a thin line. He watched his own expression change in the reflection. It was a decent pout, but would it prove effective with Ren?

Their eyes met, and it only took a few seconds before Ren relented, looking away with the slightest tint in his cheeks, “Oh, well, we can get you some new ones at the thrift store today then. I’ll just open the shop for the afternoon rush.”

“Shop? You mentioned a cafe before?” Goro looked at himself in the mirror again, still curious about the way his face changed as he showed emotions. Being attractive was very lucky; he hoped that he would be able to use it to his advantage until he was able to finally understand completely the situation he was in as well as the world around him.

“Oh right, you haven’t seen the cafe . . . ,” Ren began to head for the door but then turned around, “One thing at a time. Shall we get you some clothes?”

Goro took one last look at himself, practicing a quick smile before leaving his reflection behind to follow Ren out of Karoi's room, "Yes, I'd like that, please." Goro followed Ren down the hall passing a few doors, likely rooms for the other residents, along the way, "What did she mean by 'old feather'?"

Ren answered, still leading him through the building, "Oh, most haibane are teens or younger. Seeing haibane our age, early twenties, is very rare, so that's why she said there are only five of us."

"Living here?"

"In all of town?" Ren clarified.

"Why? Where do they go? Do they die?" He shot the questions out like rapid-fire.

"No, no, nothing like that.” Ren didn’t look back, but the wave of his hand was becoming very familiar to Goro. He was likely the type of person who’d wave every serious conversation off or at least every concern. “They go on their Day of Flight.”

"Day of Flight?" Goro hoped the desperation in wanting to know more wouldn’t become a normal feeling. It would be better if there was some kind of class or at least a book that would explain his current situation. He could just read that instead of asking so much of others.

"Yes, it's the day a haibane is allowed to travel beyond the wall."

"The wall? You mentioned it before."

Ren opened a door and Goro immediately put his arms up to shield himself from the light of the sun. It was a door leading outside to a small balcony with a flight of stairs that led down to the street below. Goro hadn't been expecting it, and when his eyes adjusted and he brought his arms down, he realized that he could see it, there, in the distance, outside of the town, a wall. From this distance, it was impossible to tell how tall it was, but, even from this distance, it was impossible to see over it, too.

After a long moment, Ren spoke, careful and slow, "This town operates in complete isolation from the rest of the world . . ." He had locked the door behind them and had come to stand beside him without Goro even noticing.

"I don't understand."

"Only the Toga are allowed to communicate with the people who come to trade from outside the walls. They’re the only form of communication with anyone from the other side.

"So only trade?"

"Yes, it’s done only through the Toga."

“From what you’re saying, you make it sound like no one is allowed to leave.” Goro didn’t remember anything of the world he previously lived in, but even that sounded strange. It sounded like a prison rather than a community. Did the people of this town really get along with one another? Or with the haibane?

“That’s right. And, no one is allowed to enter to live here or even visit, either. Like I said, they only come briefly to trade, and they only trade with the Toga.”

"Who are the Toga?" Goro asked, now following Ren down the stairs around the side of a four-story brick building. Seeing the town now, it was made of storied buildings on narrow streets with well-manicured plants on doorsteps and bicycles here and there. Before anything else, he noticed they were the only two people with halos and wings.

"There are a lot of theories. They study the wall and provide the halos for the haibane. They also provide haibane with their registration. We’ll register you tomorrow."

"I'm just confused now,” Goro admitted, feeling overwhelmed when he’d only been awake all of three hours in a world where nothing felt familiar and nothing felt new.

"Don't worry, Goro, you have time to figure it out," Ren said gently, his tone taking that some affectionate tone Goro had heard earlier. It felt wrong only in the sense that Goro felt he'd done nothing to deserve it. If he could just get past that feeling, he could admit to himself that it would be a welcome voice he could easily get used to.

When he said nothing in return, Ren added, "Let's get you some clothes you feel comfortable in and then we can grab some things at the market to make dinner later."

"That sounds nice," he replied quietly, feeling the beginning of a headache. He appreciated Ren’s patience, but he didn’t appreciate that he kept being told something wasn’t important or that it could wait. He wanted to understand everything, and he couldn’t wait until he was—

Wait. Until what?

Why was he so suspicious? Was that the right word? Was it only because he didn’t know anything? Had he always been this way? Had he been in trouble before this? Or, had he done something to someone else?

A sound as loud as thunder.

But it hadn’t been thunder, had it?

But then what?

After walking a few steps behind Ren for about a half hour, Goro stopped when something caught his eye.

“I like that,” he said, halting in front of a tailor that had a navy colored jacket on a dress form for the display in the window of the shop.

Ren followed his line of sight and smiled, “Oh, well, we can’t buy things new, so we’re going to the thrift shop.” He turned to keep walking.

“What do you mean?” Goro walked beside him whereas previously he’d been walking behind too trapped in thought to keep up with any kind of conversation.

Ren explained, “As haibane, we can only use the things humans throw away.”

“What?" Goro stopped, and Ren did the same, watching him closely as he processed the words. "Doesn’t that seem, I don’t know, contrary? You do work, don’t you? At the shop you were talking about?” The way Ren had said it didn’t sit well with the new haibane at all. It wasn’t that the items were used; it was that they were _thrown away_.

Discarded.

“That’s right, but,” Ren appeared uncomfortable suddenly and his right hand went up into his hair to play with his bangs absently, “ . . . like I explained earlier, most haibane are temporary.” Ren began to walk again.

He’d called it the Day of Flight. But then, was he essentially arguing that their time here in this world didn't matter because it was short lived? How long had Ren been there? It had been long enough to form a close bond with Karoi, at least. He had a job. And, she was a teacher to the kids he’d seen earlier. Just how temporary were they, the haibane; how little did their time there mean if during that time they accomplished so much?

"Because they leave?" He had fallen behind Ren once more and so he ran to keep up and then keep pace beside him on the cobblestone street, "Why do they leave?"

He shrugged, appearing to not want to discuss it at all, "They're ready to, I guess."

"So this _is_ purgatory?" Goro tried again.

"Who knows?" Ren dodged the issue again entirely.

"Do the Toga?" Goro tried.

"Probably not?" Ren wouldn’t look at him.

"But they can leave the town,” Goro pressed, despite his headache growing stronger.

"No, they can only communicate with outsiders. Look, I don't know, okay?” Ren gave up, finally, and Goro decided that defeat didn’t look well on Ren at all. In fact, his thirst to know more and solve the mystery of the world he’d been born into disappeared entirely and was replaced instead with shame.

He shouldn’t have pressed Ren; he should just accept things as they were. After all, it wasn't as if he could do anything about them now.

"None of this makes any sense,” he whispered, surprising himself even as the words had escaped his lips.

"You said earlier that you'd take things one at a time, right? Maybe you should just--"

Goro interrupted him, "I’m sorry. I just don't like this feeling . . . I don't like not knowing."

Ren stopped and Goro did the same, turning to look at him. Over Ren’s shoulder Goro could see a child was pointing at them from the other side of the street and pulling on his mother’s sleeve. He must have sensed Goro’s distraction because Ren put a gentle hand on his shoulder with his thumb against his neck at an attempt to calm him, "No one does, but at this rate, you'll make yourself sick."

Goro spoke without thinking, "You sound concerned. Duty? Obligation? Because you found me?" He blushed suddenly, shame taking him again. Ren didn't deserve to be spoken to like this—questioned as he was. He had helped Goro so much. He’d brushed his wings free of blood. He’d taken care of him when he’s been sick. He’d found him . . . Wait, what did that even mean?

To be found?

_'. . . the things humans throw away.'_

"No. It's not like that,” Ren replied, clearly trying not to look hurt.

"What is it like?" Goro swallowed.

Ren’s hand moved From his shoulder to his cheek, leaning in to force Goro’s eyes into his. As he spoke, Goro could feel his breath on his lips, "We're both haibane. In this world, we are all we have."

 

* * *

 

"Sae-san, this is Goro," Ren introduced them, and, unlike Karoi, Sae didn't take his hands but instead merely nodded at him as she sat down at the bar of the cafe.

"Pleased to meet you," Goro smiled with simple and rehearsed pleasantry doing his best to keep up with the many new faces he'd met today. After they'd gotten his clothes altered at the thrift shop, courtesy of the man who owned it, they'd met the children and helped them get ready for bed.

"Likewise. Ren has been looking after you quite closely; I was eager to meet the sleeping beauty he'd become smitten with," she said, her voice deep and mature. Goro understood immediately why she seemed to be the haibane that the others looked up to; from her presence alone, she seemed like a strong leader.

"That's going too far," Ren pouted from the other side of the counter. He was the only one in an apron and the only one behind the bar; somehow, to Goro, he felt too far away. He shifted in his seat, careful to not sit on his new clothes and pull at his wings from behind; they still felt sore. He'd been able to wear what Ren had purchased for him from the thrift shop out, his wings fitting out the holes in the back that the shopkeeper had added for him. Instead of wearing Ren's clothes, he now had what he'd picked out: a crisp white blouse, a pair of dark-wash jeans, and an oversized vest that fit long enough to be likened more to a dress than a vest. It wasn't until the alterations had already been made that Ren had bothered to point it out to him, however, so, despite now feeling self-conscience about it, he was stuck with his seemingly genderless look for the foreseeable future.

"Is it really though? We heard about it all the way in the art district," a woman with short, dark hair and a pair of sunglasses on her forehead entered through the cafe door, a large, heavy looking bag slung over one shoulder.

"Ichiko-san! You made it!" Karoi pounced on her with a hug, and they panicked only a second before Karoi took the bag from their new guest and set it on the cafe bar.

Ichigo laughed, "Hell yeah! Fresh meat! We haven't had a proper hazing in some time." She gave Goro a wink and he merely smiled pleasantly in return.

"All of the other old feathers are women?"

Ichiko gave a mock scowl, her pretty face rolling eyes in Sae's direction, "Oh please, he's already using Leblanc terms?" She sat down on the other side of Karoi who was to Goro's left, "Goro-kun, right? You don't have to stay here, you know? You can come live with us in the art district."

"We found him, Ichiko," Ren voiced from behind the bar as he began to pour whatever Ichiko had brought into five individual glasses.

"Well, it is technically his choice Ren," Sae said firmly, enough so that Karoi shifted and Ichiko smirked.

Ren didn't appear happy, however, his tone suddenly sharper, "I get that, but he--"

"Thank you for the offer." Goro interrupted, trying to lighten the mood with a smile in Ichiko's direction, "I think I could be happy here, though."

He looked at Ren, and their eyes met. The cool gray of his irises calmed him down; he hoped he could do the same for him. Without words, he hoped that Ren understood that he wasn't going anywhere.

Karoi put a hand to her mouth, "Oooohhh, I get it."

"Karoi-san, stay quiet," Sae smirked from Goro's right.

"Lips sealed," the other winked.

Again, Goro and Ren exchanged looks, but as soon as Ichiko grabbed for the last glass, she broke their silent communication with a raised glass and a cheer, "Let the drinking begin!"

 Goro took every detail in how they toasted, how much they drank, what they talked about, how they addressed each other--everything. These old feathers had clearly been together for quite a while, so he'd need to make up for the lack of experience with them with as much as he could discern from surface-level knowledge.

 "Oh, it's very sweet," he remarked after taking a sip only after seeing everyone else do so first.

Karoi smiled brightly at him, "It's good, right? Ichiko makes it."

Ishiko laughed, her energy infectious, "Yeah, we haibane in the art district do pretty much whatever we want, so contributing fine cider to the town's exports is one of them--quite profitable, too."

From what Goro could gather from the conversation, there were two places in town that housed haibane--where they were now and the art district that Ichiko had come from. "But wait, you're the eldest of the haibane there?"

"Yeah, that's right," she nodded, setting her glass down for Ren to refill it dutifully from the other side of the bar.

"How old are the others?" Goro asked.

"The next eldest, Haru-chan, is seventeen according to the doc in town. In the town of Palace, she can help me make and bottle the cider, but she can't drink it. Wild, huh?" Ichiko took her newly filled glass from Ren before moving from the chair beside Karoi to the bar itself, sitting on top of it as if she did so frequently. When no one even gave a second glance, Goro assumed it was normal for her to behave in such a way.

"How old is next eldest after me?" Goro asked.

"Futa?" Ren offered, holding his own barely touched glass of cider.

"That's right," Sae confirmed before looking to Goro, "She's about thirteen according to Tae-sensei."

Goro nodded, a finger to his lips as he turned the information over in his mind, "So that's what 'old feather' means?"

Ichiko laughed, "You sure are full of questions. You must have been a detective in a past life."

"Or a lawyer," Sae offered.

"Or a reporter?" Kaori tried.

"Or a--"

"So you all agree that this place is some kind of purgatory?" Goro said suddenly, cutting Ren off before he could finish his sentence.

The others went quiet immediately and the atmosphere of the cafe went colorless as if the joy had been sucked dry in an instant. It was Sae who broke the silence, "We don't really talk about it in that way, Goro."

"It's taboo," Karoi said softly, her features gentle.

Instead of feeling guilty, Goro instead glared in Ren's direction, " _Thanks, Ren._ "

"Anytime," Ren smiled as if he were entirely oblivious to the shift in the cafe.

Ichiko laughed, splitting the tension with sarcasm of her own, "I'm sure _he_ is the _least_ helpful in acquainting you with Palace. Basically, we are seen as something not human here, so we’re regarded as sacred but also with suspicion.”

Sae picked up from there, “Most of the humans in town are not friendly towards haibane because haibane are temporary.”

“The Day of Flight?” Goro asked.

“Ren, you told him so much in one day?” Karoi was eyeing him, using that same fond tone she'd used earlier in the day.

“He asked?” Ren tried to look innocent.

"Goro." Sae beckoned.

He turned to face her.

"This is your new life now. This is your family. What matters are the bonds you build with us and what you do with your time in Palace. Living in the past will get you nowhere, and it will only lead to pain both for yourself and for the others around you. Do you understand?"

_'This is your family.'_

_'This is your family.'_

_'This is your family.'_

Goro looked up when he felt the hand on his cheek, and his eyes shot wide as the image of Ren reaching out to him blurred.

When had he started crying?

"This was too much for you in one day. I'm sorry," Ren whispered softly, his eyes gentle and patient.

Goro shook his head, wiping at his face, "No, I really--" a sob broke his thoughts, "I really--I shouldn't have pried."

There were two hands on his cheeks now, thumbs wiping at his tears as they continued to fall. The blurry image of Ren drew closer, and, to Goro's surprise, he felt lips on his forehead as Ren placed a gentle kiss there. "Let's get you to bed, okay? We can try this again soon. You need to rest." 

Goro didn't understand why none of Ren's behavior felt intrusive or alarming. He hadn't expected the hands or the kiss or the gentle words, but upon receiving all of them, it left him only wanting more.

Sae looked nervous, "He's right, Goro; please let him take you upstairs."

Goro could only nod, regret filling him the moment he realized that consent meant Ren would have to leave him to walk back around the bar to escort him upstairs. He didn't move again, the tears continuing to fall relentlessly until Ren was beside him once more and leading him upstairs to the room he'd woken up in.

"I-I'm sorry," he finally choked out halfway up the stairs.

"Don't be," Ren's voice comforted him as a hand on his back massaged circles to calm him down.

It wasn't until nearly ten minutes later, Goro on his side in the bed and Ren seated in the chair beside him, that Goro processed the emotion he'd been feeling.

Despite their warnings, and despite how willing all of them had been to freely give Goro their love and acceptance, something told him it wasn't meant for him.

He wasn't meant to have it.


	11. Hallucination

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains explicit content. Please see new tags.  
> Also, it's a monster. It got out of hand.

"You've been staring at me behind those glasses for three weeks in a row now. It's obvious you like what you see. You going to do something about it, or do I have to break the motherfuckers so you have nothing to hide behind anymore?"

Akechi Goro, in all his androgynous glory, had finally, after three weeks, approached him.

Too stunned to respond, Akira merely opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again, blushing deeply. To have those red eyes staring into him was too much he hadn't prepared for. Akechi Goro acted as his opposite: loud, talkative, always emotional. His personality was all over the place with the only key consistency being that it was always inconsistent. An attention whore with a penchant for drama, he also dressed like a model from a fashion magazine. In fact, it wouldn't come to Akira’s surprise at all if he already had some kind of following. Probably Instagram famous. Akira would have looked if he actually had an account. Dressed like a genderless member of gothic punk royalty, Akechi always looked plastic with the layers of makeup he wore and his shorts, or sometimes even skirts, always showed off his god-like legs that were both muscular and impossibly slender, smooth, perfect, and begging to be touched.

Akechi dug a manicured fingernail into his temple, head tilted as he regarded Akira with exasperation, "I know they're fake. One of my people told me you don't wear them in Psy class."

His people? Akira blinked, unable to look away from painted lips and thickened eyelashes. If he kissed his glossed lips, would the kiss feel more like a woman's or a man's? Not that Akira cared either way, but his eyes were playing tricks on him and Akechi was more creature than human, so at this point he was pretty, much-uncharted territory, so no one could blame him for being curious.

_ Creature _ was certainly more appropriate for Akechi Goro. Maybe some kind of faye? An angry faye? That could spit fire and heal you in a gentle caress in the same turn?

Without warning, the creature in human skin ripped the glasses off his face, threw them on the ground, and smashed them beneath his heeled boots. Akira was still too shocked to respond, especially because now the guy was smiling, his face pretty and pleasant and flawless.

"Take me out tonight. We can talk about your pathetic obsession with me and today's class. You were, as always, a man of few words during our discourse. You make me curious. Are you just an idiot or is there something going on behind those pretty eyes?"

Akira said nothing. Was this real?

"God,” Akechi sneered, “I even complimented you.” His hands were on his hips, “You could at least say ' _ thank you _ '."

All Akira could process was how much he enjoyed being shorter in that moment.

"Give me your phone," the faye held his hand out, manicured fingernails a shade of red that fought for attention.

Akira unlocked it and handed it over, a chill running up his spine when, however briefly, their hands touched. It wasn’t fair; Akechi Goro knew he was an otherworldly creature and used it entirely to his advantage.

Within a minute, Akechi handed it back, flipped his honey-colored hair, and turned to leave, his ass noticeably tight in the denim of his shorts, "I'll text you. Don't wear anything that will embarrass me."

* * *

They met up at Hachiko at six-thirty as the sun was in the process of setting. Akira had changed into the one top he had for when he wanted to look fashionable; his fashion model friend had actually purchased it for him. Aside from the interestingly textured shirt, he hadn't changed at all. It wasn't that he didn't like a challenge; quite the opposite, he preferred to test the limits of the man in his Philosophy class with the firm opinions and even firmer thighs. He'd been caught off guard entirely earlier in the day; he wouldn't let Akechi treat him that way again.

Those had been his favorite pair of glasses. Those had been his only pair of glasses.

"That's the best you could do?" he heard him before he saw him, but when he turned around, he was immediately set to speechless once more. The man had changed again, wearing pastel netted stockings beneath shorts that had suspender straps going over a collared shirt with a bowtie. His hair done up in a high ponytail, Akira was left, once more, staring at the new transformation.

"Black goes with everything," he heard himself say.

Akechi rolled his eyes as he pulled him over to a bench nearby, "You're lucky you're pretty. Come here." Akira sat down on the end, an armrest on the side of the bench he suddenly found himself nailed against when Akechi sat down beside him, facing him with a smirk as he shimmied off his backpack. Failing to communicate anything else, Akechi shifted to move one heeled sneaker across Akira's lap and under the bar of the armrest, effectively strapping him in place. He pulled his other leg close to him as he shuffled through a bag, pulled something out, and leaned in close over Akira with it.

"Close your eyes and hold still." Akira did so and then registered his prior commitment to himself that he wasn't going to just let Akechi Goro walk all over him. He opened his eyes once more.

"Wait, what are you doing?"

Akechi put his right hand on Akira's chin to move his head, a brush in his left, "Putting on eyeliner. It's black; be happy I took your tastes into consideration."

Akira closed his eyes. Eyeliner? That was harmless. Also, it was apparently an excuse to Akechi to allow him to throw his leg over his lap so . . . No harm; no foul. He remained still even after he heard, presumably, cosmetics clinking together before he felt Akechi's hand on his chin again.

"Wait, now what are you doing?" he asked, still without opening his eyes.

"Mascara. Deal with it. I'm making you even prettier." Akira didn't respond, and even held his breath when he felt a thumb on his cheek, swiping across to remove some unseen powder. "Be grateful," Akechi added.

When Akira heard a zipper, he opened his eyes. Akechi was closing his backpack when Akira found his words again, "Are you always this aggressive?"

Akechi countered, "Are you always so submissive?"

"No," Akira replied quickly.

Akechi's eyes never left his as he slowly brought his heeled sneaker over Akira's lap when he pulled his legs back together, "Good. I like being dominated when I'm being fucked. Can you do that?"

"W-what?" Akira had gone red. He'd never met anyone that spoke about such things quite so casually, especially among a hundred people.

Akechi sat up on his knees, forcing Akira to look up at him. He tilted his head, letting his messy bangs fall to the side as he asked innocently. "Fuck me hard?"

"What?" Akira couldn't believe what he was hearing.

"Don't pretend," Akechi's left knee moved suddenly to Akira's side which put Akechi in his lap on the bench, "that's not why you're here." He sat against him, his hands on the back of the bench as he rubbed himself against Akira's thighs.

"We're in public," Akira said, no longer looking into those red eyes. If he pretended Akechi was Medusa, he'd escape this curse, right?

"Please, we're doing them a favor." Akechi's voice went low with annoyance before trilling with amusement like a satire sung by a woman scorned, "What a treat for them if they catch a glimpse of us like this. Fuck, you're not pretty; you're gorgeous. I want you to fuck me right here." And this time, he grinded against him, literally rolling into him as if to fuck with their clothes on.

No, if not Medusa, Akechi would just end up a siren. His words echoed in Akira's ears like a desperate plea despite the mocking tone. He pushed him away, practically picking him up to move him off of him, "Stop. Stop, now, you-"

"That's fine. Fine." Akechi moved off of him and stood up, practically striking a pose when he did so. He acted like he was oblivious to the scene he'd caused, but he was radiating sex appeal with more ferocity than a runway model. "But if you're coming with me, we're getting this out of the way." He put a hand to his mouth, and, before Akira could process it, Akechi's lips were on his, and when he opened his mouth to protest, he instead felt a tongue along his with a pill pushing through. Akechi's tongue, which tasted like strawberry gum, pushed the pill back along Akira's until, to keep from biting or gagging, Akira swallowed it. Akechi broke the kiss with a smile, many people around them mumbling and pointing.

Akira put a hand over his mouth as he stood up, keeping his head down since he no longer had his glasses to hide behind any longer, "What was that?"

"Candy," Akechi beamed, joy in his tone but not in his intent.

"I don't like sweets," Akira mumbled.

"Tell me again in an hour." He felt a hand on his wrist pull him away, "Let's go."

* * *

After nearly thirty minutes of walking, which in along the way several people about their age asked to take selfies with Akechi and Akira, they finally stopped in front of a building with an open entrance that led downstairs.

"You played along so obediently, Kurusu," Akechi's nails were clicking away at his own phone; he wasn't even looking at him. "I know beauty when I see it; I can make you famous just from being with me, you know?"

"I'm not interested," Akira replied, trying to gather his thoughts that were, by now, rolling into each other like waves, impossible to tell where one began and where one ended. Akechi had literally drugged him; he honestly hadn't expected that. He was having second thoughts about their little date, but they kept folding into four and eight and sixteen that he couldn't make the choice to turn away.

"Oh?" Akechi looked up from his phone, his eyes blinking and his head tilting in a way that, this time, Akira decided was cute, "In being famous or in being with me?"

"You don't need my help in stroking your ego," Akira managed. The light from Akechi's phone was hitting his face and making him glow. What creatures glowed? Ghosts? A Phoenix? No, he wasn't a bird despite the amount of peacocking he'd proven himself to be adept in.

"Touche," he pouted briefly before practically jumping to his side, lifting the phone up in front of them, and smiling picture perfect for a selfie, “Smile!"

Akira said nothing; he didn't want to make trouble, but he did look up, silently lamenting the loss of his glasses. Akechi let him go to inspect the quality of the photo and presumably post it on whatever social media site. Akira watched him, still attempting to gather his thoughts. He felt happy and light--but nervous because narcotics were as unknown to him as the rabbit he'd followed down this hole.

And so, down the hole they went. The staircase led down three floors before a single door was before them. Akechi opened it and Akira walked in.

"Welcome to Lustre Pearl. Oh! Akechi! Hello! Oh! Who's the cutie?" a girl with hair in rivulets and too much jewelry practically jumped at Akechi. He caught her easily, kissed her on the cheek and let her go to step beside Akira.

"Aki-chan, from my philosophy class."

Akira did not miss the name, so he corrected, "Akira. Nice to meet you." He held out his hand and she shook it quickly with a smile, her attention immediately back on Akechi. Akira couldn't tell if her hand felt slimy because it was or because everything was bringing him new sensations at the moment.

"Akechi-kun is very important to us; be good to him, or we'll kill you, okay?"

"Yeah, okay." He didn't know how else to respond because she had said it so sweetly and was smiling at him like they were old friends.

"Go ahead to your table; it's free, Akechi." Purely out of obligation, she looked back to Akira, "You want a drink?"

"Just water."

Akechi chimed in, "Mika, get us both my typical."

"Be right back, babe," she smiled at him again and Akechi led them away to his table that was deep inside the club. The place was loud once they entered the main room, but there were more booths and tables than there was dance floor which was pretty typical. It was decorated like a dream that took place under the sea complete with aquariums and seashells and, Akira was sure if he waited long enough, mermaids. Akechi's table was up some stairs and around a corner nestled in a corner that offered a view from above. Akira wasn't surprised that Akechi was typically looking down on others.

They sat down and not a second later, Akechi had pulled him close to sink his nose into his neck briefly before whispering into his ear, "Now then, it's just us. Talk to me."

Akira decided that Akechi was probably just a succubus or an incubus or whatever, that sort of creature-- all seduction. He'd probably be dead by the end of the night but what a sweet death it would be. His breath on his ear alone had warmed his whole body in an instant. 

The lighting was low and the music was loud. Akira was glad that there wasn't any sort of flashing lights; he was already wondering how the candles were dancing when they were sitting still on the table, "About what?"

"Hmm, you're thinking too hard."

Akira felt glossed lips against his neck and he briefly wondered how he'd gotten here before his lips parted and he exhaled through his mouth. Akechi felt so good. His kiss was so soft and fervent. Why was he so desperate for touch? Did he really just enjoy Akira that much? How was he allowed to respond? Could he touch him? Could he kiss him back?

Wait, weren't they supposed to be talking? Akira watched the candle dance, not even aware that Mika had already brought their drinks--six glasses waiting on the table. "Why do you dress like that?"

Akechi pulled away, a smile on his lips as Akira turned his head to watch him pull his feet onto the booth seat, "Because I'm cute, and it gets me what I want. Anything I want, actually. It's why you can't keep your eyes off of me, right?"

Akira shrugged, not realizing that he was licking his lips, "It's part of it, but not the catalyst, no."

Akechi smiled in the low light, and for once, it didn't look mischievous, but instead, appeared eager, even a touch vulnerable, "Tell me."

Akira turned to face him, pulling his own feet up into the booth likely thanks to the effects of the drugs telling him it was a good idea, "In philosophy class when we were discussing nihilism, you said ' _ we've already lost _ '."

Akechi blinked, his smile flinching for only a second, "Yeah."

"You really think that?" Akira hated how far away they were now. A second ago everything had been moving too fast, but now he felt like they weren't moving fast enough.

Goro laughed, "And what if I do? You going to analyze me, Kurusu?"

Akira smiled, enjoying the real smile on the other's lips, "I already have."

That did it. Akechi leaned forward until he was crawling over Akira from between his legs, "Oh, tell me."

Akira bit his bottom lip as he balanced them both in the seat. Those red eyes were rubies; were they shimmering? "You like talking about you, don't you?" Akira felt himself smirk, confidence coming from somewhere he'd never accessed, "Hearing others' perceptions of you? It's important to you."

Akechi sat back on his heels suddenly, a frown on his face, "It's important to everyone."

Akira leaned forward again, righting himself in the seat. "To some degree, of course, but to you, it's especially important." He turned to lean on the table and propped his head up in his hand, looking up at Akechi as the light from the candle danced across his face, "You thrive on that empty praise from your blind followers that shower you in shallow love."

Akechi stared at him blankly for a few seconds before he burst into laughter, practically giggling as his hair fell around his head like cascading waterfalls, "I knew it!"

Akira nearly forgot to respond; he'd never seen anything so beautiful in his life, "Knew what?"

"You're hiding so much-- those eyes, that passion, that anger; I love it." Finally properly sitting in the seat at the table, he settled beside Akira.

"Do you?" Akira asked, feeling warm.

"Yeah." Akechi leaned in and kissed him once on the lips, the gesture much sweeter than anything they'd exchanged thus far, "Tell me more."

Akira was smitten and warm and hungry, "You." He said after that took the first drink together-- some kind of cinnamon flavored shot, "You crave love. You're desperate for it, so much so that you seek it in everyone you meet, taking anything you can get in hopes that it fills the emptiness inside you-- satisfy the hunger for affection and acceptance you can't seem to sate." He didn't really know what he was saying anymore, but being candid a moment ago had been the right choice, so he'd run with it.

"So what?" Akechi was pouting, clearly, especially as he took the next drink that had been lined up for them and began to suck something pink and orange through the straw.

Akira continued, "So, you're pathetic. Empty. Shallow. Fake." The make-up and photos and fans and drama and attitude and baseless anger and aggression? Akira saw no reason for any of it, "A narcissist in love with his own tragedy, his own self-hate."

Akechi was glaring at him, "No one has ever spoken to me like that! What gives you the right?"

Akira smiled, taking his own fruity drink to take a sip all for the purpose of making Akechi wait, “No one has ever drugged me. What gives you the right?"

"Oh please." Akechi deflated a smile suddenly back on his lips.

Akira couldn't keep up with his mood changes.

"What did you give me?" he put the drink down and faced Akechi in his seat, his hands on the other without any other purpose than to make contact with someone, "Everything is glowing--especially you."

Akechi put his own drink down and grinned, taking Akira's hands in his and lacing their fingers together,"I told you. Candy."

"You drugged me," Akira protested.

"But you like it," Akechi said, smiling when he suddenly leaned in and rubbed their noses together.

"That's not the point," Akira sighed, returning the affection he realized he'd never received from anyone. Everything felt new and sweet and soft and exciting and-

"Ugh, just don't stop touching me," he heard Akechi say as he lead his hands to his hips and their mouths fell together.

* * *

"Akechi, are you really taking me to a love hotel?"

His laughter bubbled up and he reached for Akira's hand while walking backward to face him, "You said you'd never been; it'll be fun!" He stopped and Akira nearly ran into him when he put his free hand on Akira's chest and winked, "I have a favorite one."

"You've taken others there?" Akira's expression was warm and his arms felt like noodles as he wrapped them around Akechi. He couldn't process how he actually felt about it; for the better part of their time together, especially since they'd arrived at the club, Akira had been holding nothing back--voicing his thoughts without any sort of processing or censorship. And Akechi, he’d been as unreadable as ever fluctuating from one mood to the next, but, he’d also been more open. He’d been flirtatious, but nothing about it felt empty. Still, how would Akira actually know if he were being genuine or not? What would it take to prove that he was different from the others to Akechi? Wait, did he want to be different that badly? What was he thinking?

"Possessive already?" Akechi grinned.

Akira, completely missing the stares of the people around them, pressed his face into Akechi's neck as he wondered if he could remove Akechi's bowtie with his teeth. "You're mine, aren't you? I don't have to be possessive because you decided for yourself."

"Oh, did I?" Akechi moved to rest his head on top of Akira's, something possible only due to his heels since their difference in height was apparent but not significant.

Akira inhaled his scent: roses and bergamot. "Hmm, I'll prove it to you." His fingers trailed down his sides and back up his back to his shoulder blades.

"God, you're so good with your hands," Goro melted into him a moment, kissed his forehead, and pulled away from the embrace to go into a Lawsons, "Stay here; I need some things."

Akira watched Akechi through the windows of the convenience store as he picked up condoms, water, and a few other things. Everything had happened so fast; he was still trying to process it even as his brain continued to fold on top of itself. He tried to replay everything Akechi had told him in the last two hours. He'd revealed so much, too much, even, and Akira had returned everything in kind, somehow desperate to make sure that Akechi knew everything-- everything about him. He couldn't remember ever being so open with anyone before.

At the hotel, they ended up in a decent sized room that mirrored some of the themes of Lustre Pearl with various hues of violet and a single salt-water aquarium in the wall above the bed. Nothing else about the room was unique from any other typical hotel room aside from the touchscreen menu by the bedside. Akira wasn't sure what he was expecting, but it wasn't anything like he'd seen in movies.

Akechi took off his boots and tossed his backpack, a plastic bag, and himself onto the bed with a bounce. Akira followed suit and sat across from him.

"How are you feeling?" Akechi asked as he pulled out a large bottle of water from the bag.

"Warm." It was a vague enough answer. He wasn't sure if Akechi was genuinely concerned about it or if he was giving him a way out of the situation.

Akechi handed the bottle of water out to him after removing the cap, "Drink this. You'll get dehydrated."

Maybe he was already; he felt the beginning of a headache that could potentially be due to dehydration. Akira took the bottle and blinked when he saw another one of equal size in Akechi's hands. So, he was attempting to care for him despite the fact that he'd drugged him against his will? It would have been sweet if, again, he hadn't drugged him against his will. Still, Akira couldn't find it in himself to be upset--not about Akechi or anything else. He was in a love hotel with the man of his dreams, who, after spending the last few hours with him, only felt more perfect than he had imagined.

"Have you had sex with a man before?" Akechi asked with nothing behind it but curiosity. Akira appreciated that, in the last two hours, the layers that Akechi Goro hid behind were slowly peeling back to reveal who he really was. Whatever he'd slipped Akira had made him more confident, relaxed, and affectionate, but Akechi must have taken the same because as they spoke, he went from aggressive, to playful, to, in Akira's opinion,  _ adorable _ as the time had flown by. Truth be told, he'd never connected with someone so suddenly before; unfortunately, he wasn't sure if it was because of the company or the help.

Akira audibly finished the entire two-litre bottle, recapped it, and left it empty on the bed. "Nope," he said finally. The farthest he'd actually gotten with a guy on a date was a kiss--not even a makeout session. It hadn't done much for his ego at the time.

Akechi knocked the empty bottle off the bed, pulled out some kind of many-layered sandwich and unwrapped it. Akira thought that was the end of the conversation until Akechi finally asked, "Have you ever had sex?"

Akira laid down on the bed to look up at Akechi as he ate, "Nope." He noticed it was a sandwich that he'd never actually tried before despite seeing it every time on the shelf at the convenience store: strawberries and whipped cream. He'd always wondered what kind of people actually ate those things; now he knew.

Akechi's eyes widened slightly before he looked away and readjusted his face,"Oh." Akechi's lips were still somehow glossed even as he ate. Akira wasn't sure if he was imagining it or if he'd reglossed them when he wasn't looking.

"You look surprised," Akira lied. Maybe Akechi had never been with a virgin before? He hoped it wasn't a turn-off.

Akechi's lips broke into a smile once more, "You're just a good kisser, and I wasn't lying when I said you're good with your hands." He finished his sandwich and put the trash back in the bag, pulling some kind of savory bread out, "You're not lying to me?"

"What would I gain from lying about that?" Akira countered. He was honestly pleased to hear praise from Akechi, however small it was.

"You  _ are _ gay, aren't you?" Akechi blinked.

Akira smiled, his hand moving to touch Akechi's netted leg, "I've never really cared either way. Though," he looked back up to meet his eyes, "I especially like you."

Akechi continued drinking his own water, "And what am I to you?"

"Different," Akira said without thinking.

It seemed to please Akechi because he moved closer to Akira so that his hand could reach further up his leg and Akechi could reach his free hand into the other's curly black hair, "You're different to me, too." For a moment, they just continued caressing each other, Akira's hand lazily moved up and down pastel fishnet, his fingers traveling inside the netting to press and massage in random places. Akechi closed his eyes and kept his fingers in Akira's hair, massaging his scalp. Then, as if an alarm had gone off inside his head, he sat up suddenly and grabbed the bread to practically shove it in Akira's face, "Eat this."

The other sat up and took the bread, deciding that Akechi knew better than he did in terms of whatever they had taken, "Okay . . ."

As Akira ate, Akechi finished his water and let the empty bottle fall to the floor. He took out the condoms and put them on the nightstand and then moved everything but his backpack off the bed. He left to get a towel and came back to sit in front of Akira. Akira's eyes had only left him to observe the colorful fish in the tank. Akechi had taken care of the room fee and had surprisingly not booked it by the hour but for the night. He wondered how expensive a room with an aquarium was. Even if there was nothing else special about it, he knew salt-water aquariums required quite the upkeep. The fish were beautiful as they floated and swam and when he--

"Kurusu, I like you." Akechi was sitting on the bed, his voice pulling Akira back away from the fish tank.

Akira smiled, "Are those the drugs talking?"

"Please. What is it, nine-thirty? My high wore off like an hour ago," Akechi unzipped his backpack and began to rummage through it.

Akira could only blush in response. That statement meant several things; Akechi was apparently sober enough to take care of him and say, with a steady head, how he actually felt. It was honest. But, it also meant that the dosage of whatever it had been had been small for Akira's benefit, and if it didn't affect Akechi in the same way, then he probably had already built up some kind of immunity. Did that mean addiction or something else? A voice in Akira's head said something about caution, but he stamped it down quickly; there was a reason the voice was so small.

"I like you," Akechi went on, "because you're different." He pulled something else from his bag, a red and white pillbox in the shape of a capsule that, when he popped it opened, revealed three other smaller tablets.

"Is that the same thing?" Akira asked curiously. He hadn't actually seen the pill he'd swallowed after all.

"It's not. It's for me," Akechi took one out and carefully moved the other two back into the capsule.

"Why only you?" Akira didn't like that, but he still couldn't find it in himself to be upset over anything, so his tone was completely off from what he'd been hoping for.

Akechi, only for a second, looked nervous, "This is different; I'm not going to force you to--"

"I want it," Akira cut him off, swallowed the last of the bread, and crawled closer to him, "I want to experience what you experience." Akechi looked unimpressed. Akira moved closer, pushing the backpack aside to move into Akechi's lap, "Honestly, I don't really see the purpose because simply being in your presence does things to me that don't happen when I'm with anyone else, but--" His fingers trailed down Akechi's arm to the hand in which he was holding the pill box, "If you're doing this," he maneuvered his fingers beneath Akechi's until the pill-shaped box was in his palm instead, "I want to join you."

"Are you sure?" Akechi asked quietly, his red eyes searching Akira's.

"Yeah."

"Okay." Akechi took the pillbox back, handed him one, closed it up, and then put it back in his backpack. "Put it under your tongue and leave it there. It'll take about ten minutes to dissolve."

"Is this what I think it is?" Akira blinked.

"Yes, probably." Akechi put his own tablet beneath his tongue.

Akira did as he was told, lamenting only that having it beneath his tongue made it more difficult to speak. It was possible, just not easy. The tablet didn't taste like anything as it slowly began to dissolve in his mouth.

Akechi moved away from Akira, and Akira reluctantly complied. "It will take some time to kick in. In the meantime, porn?" Akechi rolled off the bed to grab the touchscreen on the nightstand.

"No, no porn." Akira waved it away dismissively, and after a moment, he began to play with his bangs, rubbing hair between his fingers, "Play me your favorite music?"

Akechi chuckled, expertly keeping the pill in place, "Careful, Kurusu, I might fall in love with you." Akechi pulled a strange looking handheld speaker from his backpack.

"Would that be so bad?" Akira smirked, watching him as he turned the lights out leaving only the aquarium light on.

Akechi smirked, "I don't know. Would it?" He plugged his phone into his speaker in the dim light and began to tap at his phone.

"No," Akira promised.

Akechi didn't respond. He picked a song, and just as the music began to play, his speaker lit up and shot the reflection of water up onto the ceiling. That's why it had looked so strange; it was a projector. Water's reflection, in an ombre of colors, shimmered across the ceiling from where Akechi set it down on the shelf of the headboard. He laid down, his head at the foot of the bed. Akira joined him.

As they laid side by side, Akechi eventually reached for Akira's hand, his pinky first reaching for him timidly. Akira took his hand in his and they stared up at the reflection as the music filled the room.

"Do you believe in love at first sight?" Akechi finally asked.

"Until only recently," Akira answered automatically.

"Same," Akechi whispered.

Akira’s prior insecurities over Akechi’s authenticity suddenly felt so ludicrous. 

The pill was gone now, and it made it easier to speak. Akira turned his head to look at Akechi's profile, "Who is this?"

"Billie Eilish."

"I think I've heard of her?" He wasn't sure. Maybe not.

Akechi didn't look away from the patterns on the ceiling, "Her voice is perfect. I like Lorde, too, and Lana del Rey. At least, that's who I'm listening to now."

"All women?" Akira asked. He listened to a little bit of everything, but, because of that, he couldn't name most of the people he liked.

"Yeah." After a few minutes, the voice changed. Akira guessed it was one of the others that Akechi had mentioned. It was all in English, so he barely understood a word of it; English was not his strong suit. Akechi broke the silence between them, clearly grabbing at the first thought that came to mind as the music droned on, "Women are at a disadvantage, but that disadvantage is freeing in some ways. I was jealous. I wanted to be cute; I wanted others to let their guard down around me."

Akira effortlessly followed his line of thinking. It was easy to talk to Akechi Goro about Akechi Goro. "You sound like you just wanted people to be easier to manipulate," Akira spoke, again, without thinking about the consequences of his words, however. He blamed the drugs; he'd been nothing but careless. Despite how freeing speaking his thoughts felt, it was a wonder to him that it hadn't gotten him into trouble with Akechi yet.

Instead of being angry, Akechi only nodded, still staring up at the ceiling, "Yeah, that's probably true." After another long moment, he added, " . . . Society doesn't make any sense. People just see me as they want to, and it makes it nearly impossible not to win against them."

"That's kind of dark," Akira pointed out. If Akira understood correctly, Akechi was saying that people, in general, wanted to be tricked, played, manipulated. They were far more eager to believe a fantasy, no matter how untouchable, rather than make the effort to investigate the reality, even in the face of a potential malicious intent.

Akechi practically whined, "Well, I do like it though . . . being different." He shifted, his voice still under the sea of lights, "I like the attention most of all, but, I enjoy what comes with it, too . . . and you-you're still . . ."

"Different?" Akira offered, smiling.

"Yeah. You don't think I'm cute, but you still want me," Akechi voiced.

Akira turned on his side, letting go of Akechi's hand in the process. He propped his head up on his elbow and looked down at his date, "You're cute. And twisted. And sad. And strong. And manipulative. And sweet. You're so many contradictions. I love it."

"Me?" Akechi blushed in the dim light.

"You really want to hear that," Akira observed, his head, his body, and his heart beginning to feel light.

"No one has before," Akechi said easily, his red eyes small fires set alight inside his skull. Or, wait, maybe that was the reflection of the aquarium light; Akira couldn't tell the difference anymore.

Akira reached a hand into honey-brown hair and pulled the hair tie free slowly, his fingers on silk so fine it felt like touching nothing at all. Maybe spider webs felt like this or the fine threads of fate that the Moirai wove? "That seems hard to believe." He continued to run his fingers through the honey-colored silk, eyes affectionate as he marveled at the sensation.

Akechi sighed, beginning to tremble beneath his touch, " _ 'I like you. You're sexy. You're cute. You're fun.' _ No, never  _ that _ ." He didn't say anything for a moment, seemingly distracted. Finally, he quietly added, " . . . I told you earlier about my past."

Akira could only somewhat process the conversation now, "Yeah. Come here," he pulled him up by the bowtie, and soon he felt the weight of Akechi on top of him. He closed his eyes as he felt Akechi move and shift his weight against him until he was sitting up over his thighs.

When Akira opened his eyes again, Akechi was glowing, a halo around him from the light of the aquarium. Above him, he saw the water's reflection on the ceiling. No, the ceiling was moving now, gentle waves had swallowed the both of them up; good thing they could breathe underwater.

Who's aquarium were they in?

Akechi, his legs straddling him, leaned forward and pressed his lips to his. Akira kissed him slow, aware enough that he was under the influence of whatever they'd taken but too far gone to care because a kiss had never felt quite this intoxicating. Akechi was breathing poison into him that only made him feel lighter. They weren't actually kissing at all; they were breathing new life into each other, their tongues speaking a language that belonged only to them. Akira felt Akechi press into him as hands cradled his head, and he was sure that they weren't even making out. Instead, Akechi was worshipping him. That had to be what was happening because his touch left promises on his skin, words of devotion that he'd never whisper from his lips. Akira tried to sit up, his hands going to Akechi's hips as he moved. He couldn't even reach skin, but, already, Akechi moaned with need as Akira pressed inside his mouth harder and gripped his hips tighter. Eager, Akira's hands slipped lower, feeling for the hem of Akechi's shorts to send his hands up. Akechi moved to give him better access and, quite suddenly, they broke apart, panting.

Maybe they could breathe underwater, but they'd have to stop for air between their prayers. Akechi was still glowing, but his red eyes had gone dark, a garnet color too cold with lust to look away from anything other than the object of his devotion. Akira smiled lazily, still catching his breath before he leaned in and followed through on the impulse he'd had earlier. Could he undo a bowtie with his teeth? He'd never actually even tied one himself so--

He heard laughter trickle out above him and he pulled away blushing. Akechi said nothing as he pulled each end of the tie loose himself, smiling and clearly adoring Akira's mistake as he transformed the bow into a single tie and pulled it easily out from beneath the collar. Akira counted himself lucky that Akechi had found it endearing. Deciding he wasn't as adept as he'd hoped with his teeth and tongue alone, Akira's fingers went for the buttons on Akechi's shirt, fumbling slightly with them but managing still to get the last of them after Akechi freed his shirt from his shorts. Akechi removed his shirt and pulled off what he'd been wearing beneath to reveal his bare chest. Akira stared a moment before reaching out to touch his skin registering distantly that it was smooth and warm and so unlike the marble from which it must have been born from. Akira felt himself being watched as his fingertips freely explored the curves and lines and folds of skin. He didn't know what he'd been expecting; it only made sense that Akechi's body was as flawless as the--

"It's--"

Akechi pulled Akira's hands away from his back and placed them instead on his shoulders as he leaned back in the bed to sink further underwater.

Akira had felt something when his left hand had traveled from his hips to his back, but as Akechi pulled him down on top of him, he quickly forgot about the sensation altogether. His lips met Akechi's again and he closed his eyes as he felt hands in his hair--maybe too many--two or four or ten-- and down his back and up his sides and grabbing at his ass and--

Akira tightened his grip on Akechi's shoulders and pressed, pushing Akechi further into the bed as he rose up, rolling himself shamelessly against the man beneath him.

Akira realized Akechi still only had two hands, both of them gripping his arms desperately-- fingernails sinking into skin. Akira marveled at the colors on Akechi's eyelids. Had they always been there? This whole time? Subtle pinks, a quiet violet, and a touch of white inside? Why hadn't he noticed it before? He leaned down and kissed them, hearing Akechi whisper his name, his  _ first _ name, in a quiet whisper.

Was Akechi the treasure at the bottom of the ocean? Had he been here all this time, just waiting to be found?

Akira sat up again, his eyes distracted by the fish in the tank, the colorful coral providing places to hide. He kept staring, losing track of time and place as the fish floated against the tank, two curiously facing the glass as if to speak to him. Akechi had an affinity to water. Perhaps he  _ was _ a siren, then, and that was why--

He felt something move beneath him, behind him, and, without an understanding of how it had happened, two hands were reaching around him to unbutton his jeans and pull the zipper down slowly. Manicured fingernails pulled at his pants and boxers until he was exposed, and, before he could register anything else, a hand was on him, stroking him, while another slid up beneath his shirt against his chest possessively.

Unable to process the pleasure, Akira fell backward and strong arms caught him, righting him only long enough to pull his shirt off. He turned around to see that the fire in Akechi's eyes had returned, and, though he wasn't glowing, he was still radiating a heat that Akira wanted to burn alive inside. They came together once more, mouths hungry first, then sated, slow and curious as their tongues spoke words in their place. This time, Akechi broke their kiss to move down Akira's jaw, planting kisses in a trail down his neck until he planted a blossom, soft first, then rough, teeth biting hard enough into skin to make Akira cry out.

Akechi pulled away with a smirk, and Akira was on him in a second, returning the gesture with equal ferocity, pleased as he felt arms embrace him as Akechi rolled against him to create friction. Akira led him back down into the sheets and his hands worked at removing Akechi's shorts, pulling them all the way down his legs and off his feet. Akechi, breathing strawberry incense, laced his fingers over his chest biting his bottom lip as his eyes dared Akira to keep going.

In the back of his mind, Akira registered that Akechi knew exactly what he was doing, even now, and that he was likely playing into his hand entirely, but all of that didn't really matter. Akira pulled Akechi free from the fishnet and removed the last piece of clothing with little thought beyond the beauty he'd found.

Akira closed his eyes to the sea and felt up Akechi's legs with his hands. Starting from his ankles, his hands slid along skin until his thumbs had followed the curve of his thighs. His hands continued to explore upward, over defined abs, nipples, collarbones, shoulders, and back down again. He could hear Akechi's breath hitch, feel his skin begin to tremble, and when he finally opened his eyes again, he saw that Akechi had gone hard. His hair was sticking to his face. His skin was glistening with sweat. Had he transformed into something else? Why was his skin sparkling like that? Akira leaned forward between his legs and, after once more closing his eyes, pressed a tongue to his quivering thigh tasting salt now instead of roses and bergamot.

" _ Akira . . . _ "

He pressed his tongue against skin before taking it in his mouth and kissing it, experimenting with his tongue and teeth before moving closer to Akechi's length. Suddenly, he felt muscles tense and he felt himself pushed back against the headboard, his eyes opening just in time to see Akechi pull furiously at the rest of his clothing until he, too, was naked in the sheets.

He'd expected Akechi to kiss him again or at least close the distance between them, but instead, Akechi, from his position on his knees, only stared down at him blankly, his eyes aflame but distant.

"I've seen you before."

Akira might have nodded, "I think so, too.

"In a dream," Akechi added, his voice heavy with a sadness Akira didn't know he was capable of until then.

"Yeah."

Akechi crawled closer to him, between his legs, and reached a trembling hand to his cheek, "How could I forget this?" His eyes were wide, wild, and Akira wanted nothing more than to set him at ease. He turned his head into Akechi's palm and kissed it sweetly, his arms going to Akechi's hips once more to rub circles with his thumbs.

"I-I-" Akira watched him shapeshift once more, deep vulnerability burning out from his eyes and enveloping his whole body in flame, ash revealing a man who'd found hope when he thought he had none, "I could be happy with you."

Akira didn't know his own eyes were wide, his mouth open in awe as his eyes took in the love he'd found. "We could both be happy," he might have said.

Goro leaned forward to whisper into his ear, "Do you feel it now?"

"Yes."

He didn't know what  _ it _ was, but he did know that he was feeling everything, everything he'd ever imagined and all of the things he never had--what he knew was real and what he'd been since ignorant of. Goro was giving him all of it. He felt himself open up to him, a silent plea for Goro to sink inside him, and Goro complied, kissing him slow from his ear to his neck, down his chest to his cock, licking up beneath him and taking him into his mouth before pulling away with a wet trail of precum and saliva to press his lips everywhere else. Akira moved to kiss any part of Goro's skin he could reach, his hands massaging affection into what his lips could not. They continued to touch and kiss, lick and suck until Akira had finally taken Goro's head in his hands and was able to kiss him on the mouth sweetly.

Tears fell from Goro's eyes and Akira caught them with his tongue as their bodies tangled together. They moved together as Akira kissed his face and drank in Goro's toxins like sweet wine. Akira heard Goro's prayers and answered them tenfold, slow, sweet, and careful as he made himself his sanctuary. Akira could have continued on like that and reached the height of their intimacy, but Goro pulled away, wiping the last few tears from his eyes as he rummaged through a drawer in the nightstand and pulled out a tube.

Moments later, Akira processed where Goro's hand was going and what would come next. He felt the hunger wash over him and land right in his groin. He watched, in awe once more with Goro's beauty, as he prepared himself for Akira to come inside him. On his knees, Goro was panting with lust as he curled two fingers inside himself. Without thinking, Akira grabbed himself and began to stroke, slow at first, but then in time with Goro's fingers. Upon seeing this Goro's left hand moved from inside himself to Akira, moving into his lap as their lips met in a slow, needy kiss. Carefully, wincing from the sensation, Goro lowered himself onto Akira and hooked his legs on either side of him. Akira was sweating, overwhelmed entirely with the pleasure already crashing inside him from their intimacy thus far. It wasn't for another minute and gentle encouragement from Goro, that he finally started to move, his hands on the other's hips as he moved slow, slamming hard into him and then rolling just nearly out before slamming back into him again. Goro didn't seem to mind the pace, his body trembling with pleasure already, likely from the euphoria set on by the drugs. In fact, each time Akira slammed inside him, he cried out, his arms wrapping around the other as he braced for the pain just before it came. As if an experiment, Akira stayed steady with his pace and then quickened it, slamming into Goro suddenly and then stopping, still inside him, to make him wait, to make him beg, to fuck him hard as he had previously requested hours ago. It wasn't until Goro had bitten into Akira's shoulder from the pain, or the pleasure, either way, that Akira stuck with a steady pace, building as he felt himself begin to reach the edge. Goro came first with Akira coming soon after, their bodies pulled apart only a moment before they tangled back inside each other, pressing desperately together certain that they'd truly become one if they were only given more time.

"I love you."

"Do you say it all the time?" Akira asked, trying to catch his breath despite being entirely convinced that he'd be riding this high forever and thus never able to reach a stable heart rate again.

"I've never said it," Goro spoke into Akira's chest, not looking up to meet his eyes.

After a long moment of committing to zero movement, Akira's eyes on the ceiling and Goro's closed against Akira's chest, Akira finally asked, "I didn't believe in anything until I met you, did I?"

"I didn't believe in anything  _ good _ until now," Goro answered.

Akira sighed, his voice light, "Be my new religion: Goro, the genderless god. I'll worship you with whispered prayer at a shrine built with lies and lipstick. Lana del Rey can sing your gospel; I'll learn all the words and it'll be my lullaby."

Akira felt eyelashes on his chest and Goro's voice vibrated against his skin, "Stop."

"Goro?"

"Hmm?"

"What are you really?" he asked, still basking in the afterglow.

"Hm?"

"I've been trying to understand all day- incubus? Medusa? Siren? Faye?"

"I'm human." He chuckled, "Maybe I was a mermaid before."

"I get it now." Akira smiled into his skin, "A human, though? The same as me. Impossible. On your tongue? Strawberries. Roses on your skin and vanilla in your hair?" No, Akira wasn’t making sense anymore, but his thoughts were no longer suppressed. He said everything he was thinking without any processing time. Would either of them remember it by the morning anyway?

Goro sat up to face him with a smile, none of those scents apparent now as the scent of sex rose up between them. "Akira--"

"A smile better than any drug, your breath is a spell--" As if to prove his point, Akira moved closer to feel Goro's breath on his face,"Oh my god, this feels so good. You feel so good."

Goro laughed, "Good, I'm glad. I feel the same way."

Akira admired the warmth in his smile. Gone was the prickly prima donna; in her wake, a man of worship spoke his honest devotion and loyalty. Why hadn’t he been taking hallucinogens on every date?  

"I want to do this forever," Akira whispered, searching claret eyes.

"Trip?"

"Praise you," he chuckled.

Goro took a deep breath and released it slowly, his own eyes searching the summer rain promised in Akira's. "Please . . . please say it."

Akira pressed a kiss to the fingers of Goro's left hand, looked up, and smiled gently, "I love you, Goro."

Eyes wide, Goro went silent forgetting even to breathe. Neither of them moved for a long time, Goro in Akira's arms as they both stared up at the lights of the projector, an ocean of violets and pinks.

"Akira?"

"What is it?" Goro hadn't moved, so Akira didn't either.

". . . I'll tell you a secret but it will break the spell," his tone had changed yet again. The words foreboding, Akira felt a chill on the back of his neck. He didn’t want the spell to break. He’d finally found what he’d always been missing. And this, this had been the best night of his life. In Akechi he saw something different, something new and promising, and, best of all, something  _ real _ .

"Nothing will," he tried to be reassuring.

Goro shifted to whisper into his ear, "None of this is real."

Real?

Akira didn't say anything for a long time as, slowly, the memories of their time together filtered through--dreams first, then reality.

"You understand, don't you?" Goro finally asked when Akira had been silent for too long.

Akira said nothing and instead pulled him closer, hands cradling his head once more and tilting it just enough to fit their mouths together. Passion renewed, he kissed Goro fervently, insistent, fighting to keep the intimacy they held in the moment.

Goro broke away, a hand over his mouth, "But I--"

Akira pulled him back, "Keep going." He kissed Goro's hand when he wouldn't put it down,   "Please keep going. It doesn't change anything."

"It changes  _ everything _ ," Goro frowned, his eyes losing life.

"It  _ doesn't _ ," Akira shook his head, desperate.

"Did you mean it back then?" Goro pushed him away but stayed in his lap, naked and warm, "The words you said before you killed me? You understood back then, didn't you?"

"That wasn't you," Akira argued.

"It  _ was _ ," Goro narrowed his eyes, " . . . Does that mean ' _ no _ '?"

"No . . . I meant them," Akira said slowly, taking a deep breath and releasing it before saying, "And I mean it now, too."

"Then say it again," Goro whispered, his eyes still empty, suddenly tired, a soberness filling them that frightened Akira.

Their eyes never blinked, searching inside one another for the truth.

"I'm sorry," he said finally, his fear swallowing his hope.

"I'm sorry, too," Goro admitted. He reached for his backpack and withdrew something long, thin, and pink.

Akira regarded it only curiously, pulling Goro back into an embrace to bring him back into their shared high, "I do want this." He kissed the top of his head and Goro wrapped his arms around him. "I want  _ you _ ." But, more than anything, he wanted the dream back.

He heard several clicks first, and then, on his back, he felt something warm and wet, " _ Akira _ . . ."

Akira practically threw him off of him, Goro falling back on the sheets, naked and smiling, a long, thin cut down his right arm. Akira stared as he tried to piece it together. In Akechi's left hand, a pink razor like the kind people used for parcels or cutting paper, dripped with red. On his right arm that same red began to spread, wrapping his arm in liquid lace.

"Say it again," Akechi pleaded, eyes still refusing to catch the flame they'd once held.

Akira didn't understand. Why was Akechi bleeding? Why was he holding that blade? Why was he acting this way? Did he only want to hear him say it? Did he want something else? Did he even realize what he was doing?

"I love you," Akira heard himself say stoically.

Goro, smiling suddenly, sat up on his knees. He'd been brought to life from the spell Akira had cast. He held his right arm out between them and pressed his manicured nails into the wound, pressing the skin down and apart to free more blood, "The red is so pretty." He laughed, tilting his head to the side flirtatiously, his smile haunting, "I can't tell what's real anymore." He grabbed for Akira's left hand and ran the blade across his palm suddenly. Akira flinched, staring at the wound with wide, unblinking eyes. Akechi leaned down to look up at him, smiling still, "Do you see them? The roses on your skin?"

Akira tried to meet the other's eyes, but he couldn't find them, "Goro, stop. That hurts."

"Hmm, it feels so good though," he said lightly, accentuating his claim by running the razor across his chest, and up his leg, and across his shoulder, freeing more and more red without so much as a flinch or a gasp, "--and it's so pretty." He sank the fingers of his right hand into one of the wounds on his leg and brought his bloodied digits to his mouth, painting his lips red, "Isn't it pretty?" He laughed again, letting his hair fall forward, and in front of his face, "I love pretty things." He flipped his hair before pressing a red finger to Akira's bottom lip, "It’s why I asked you out. I can’t believe you hid behind those glasses in Philosophy."

Akira could only watch. “You mean always, right? We were never in Philosophy class together.”

Akechi took the blade to his left cheek and cut down, slow and deep. He transferred the blade to his right hand and turned his cheek to Akira, his left hand beneath his chin as if posing in a photo shoot, "Ahh, look at it, like blossoms." He smiled, picturesque, the blood trickling from his cheek and down his neck in a steady stream.

Akira nodded, expression blank, "I see it."

When Akechi smiled, more blood spilled, some pouring from the corners of his lips, "Say it again. Please say it."

"I love you."

Akechi laughed again with a joy too out of place to identify the source of. Moving back into Akira's lap, he clicked the razor to make it longer, "We're so beautiful together like this."

Akira didn't move except to help Akechi adjust, careful and gentle as he made him comfortable.

Akechi pressed the blade in the middle of Akira's forehead, and he grimaced, biting his lip to keep from saying anything to upset the other. Akechi continued, his open wounds still spilling blood between them, "Remember when your blood poured down your face after I shot you right--" He cut a diagonal line across Akira's forehead, “Here?” and then mirrored the same cut across it, marking the spot with an "X". “You were so beautiful.”

Akira blinked, trying to keep the blood from the wound out of his eyes, “I wasn’t there to see that, remember?” He couldn't process what was happening. "Goro, doesn't it hurt?" He realized maybe Goro couldn't, either.

Goro's smile disappeared in an instant, and he looked thoughtful for only a moment before he appeared confused, "Not in comparison?" A switch flipped, and he grinned, “Oh! Remember when we colored on the crossing and then the truck--”

"Comparison to what?" Akira interrupted him, not wanting to remember something so unpleasant, “In comparison to what, Goro?”

"Death."

Akira took Goro's head in his hands, gentle as the blood from his cheek warmed his hand, "Tell me you're mine."

Akechi smiled gently and then rolled his eyes, "I'm yours. And you? We’re going to be together always, right?"

Akira nodded, letting Akechi's face go and allowing his hands to slide down his arms, ignoring entirely the blood he spread with the gesture, "Yours. Completely. Yes."

"Then you'll help?" Akechi moved the blade to place it in Akira's right hand.

"Goro?"

Goro closed the other's hand around the blade and moved his closed fist to the other side of his face, "Make me pretty for you."

Akira moved the blade away from Akechi's face, but still, as requested, cut more flowers across his body and, as he did, the siren sang her song, losing her voice to the swell of the music and the crashing of the waves. Breathing still, but no longer conscious, Akechi, finally at peace, lay in Akira's careful embrace.

_ "Play along. Make-believe it's hyper-real. But I live in a hologram with you." _

Akira let sleep take him once more, his own bloody hand dying honey-colored silk in a shade that should sooner be forgotten.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter was inspired by three songs by Lorde: "The Love Club", "Still Sane", and "Buzzcut Season".


	12. Jazz Club

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Body Horror and Suicide  
> Heads up: the POVs switch back and forth the whole time this chapter.  
>  ~~(Lyrics from 'Scared to Be Lonely' by Dua Lipa~)~~

Akira had been curious for some time now, and it was that curiosity that finally compelled him to go inside the jazz club that was down the street among the sprawling alleyways of bars in Yongenjaya. On certain nights, he could hear music as he passed by on his way home from work; brass instruments would breathe new life into the alleyway that left it too cultured for the drunken salarymen of Yongen to really quite appreciate. It wasn't that he listened to jazz much; he favored no genre of music over another, really. Instead, the rumors that spread from street to street had caught his attention; the drunken ramblings of old men in love had found their way to his coffee shop.

_ 'An angel lives in Yongenjaya.' _

_ 'A goddess blessed this city.' _

Akira believed in what he could see and touch-- that and the power of coffee. Still, rarely did Yongenjaya's gossip involve mythic beauty or refined, artistic talents. In conclusion, the rumors deserved thorough investigation, so once he learned from one of his regulars the best night to visit to earn a chance at beholding the goddess of Yongenjaya, he closed the coffee shop early and wandered the short distance to sate his curiosity.

* * *

Akechi loved Wednesday nights. In collaboration with a few other artists, she sang covers of songs accompanied by a saxophone, a piano, or even a full band. Gaining popularity over the last several months, Akechi knew that she wouldn't spend much longer in Yongenjaya. Glad to be recognized outside of the dank back allies of Shibuya ward's forgotten district, Akechi accepted the reputation that inspired her fame for what it was: old men drooling over young, untouchable flesh. It could have been worse.

"Chi-chan!" Ann, the saxophone player that had also made quite the reputation for herself, pounced on Akechi in the small space of what had been curtained off as backstage.

Akechi bit back a complaint as she felt strong, slender arms wrap around her shoulders affectionately. She'd since taught herself to be patient with Takamaki Ann; she'd endure as many over-enthusiastic gestures of affection as necessary if it meant using her talents to boost her chances at fame.

"Good evening, Ann," Akechi smiled for her, and Ann, apparently satisfied, smiled back.

"Someone I know is in the crowd tonight."

"Not Ryuji?" Akechi asked, going back to fixing her makeup.

"Ugh, no," Ann sounded temporarily disgusted before she brightened again, quite suddenly, "It's the cute barista from Leblanc."

"That coffee shop near here?" She'd walked by it several times.

"Yeah!"

"I've never been," Akechi replied flatly.

"But I told you to goooooo," Ann whined playfully with her hands on Akechi's bare shoulders.

"I've been busy." Akechi closed her compact and adjusted her sleeveless dress, shamelessly tucking her breasts and adjusting her strapless bra in Ann's presence.

Ann, unfazed by Akechi's lacking modesty, frowned in a pout, "You don't trust me."

"I trust Ann-chan very much," Akechi rolled her eyes and smiled, "I don't trust her taste in food, however."

Ann stomped her foot in objection, "That was one time!"

Akechi stood up and straightened out her dress, "Those pancakes were as flat as Futaba's chest."

"Chi-chan!"

"It's true," Akechi insisted.

Ann burst into laughter,"It  _ is _ true!"

Akechi opened her mouth to correct Ann's backstage voice when Ann put a hand over her own and her eyes went wide, "Oh, right, I was supposed to come get you. Haru's already here. It's time."

Akechi smiled, shaking her head, "Let's go then."

"Chi-chan," Ann's fingers slipped into Akecih's hair to fluff it up some, tucking some to the side to cover one of her eyes, "Yongenjaya’s  _ goddess _ , is so appropriate."

Akechi frowned, "Hopefully, it doesn't stick. I plan on conquering more than this old neighborhood."

Ann smiled—laughter airy and warm, "Let's do this!"

Akechi smiled demurely; maybe she did appreciate Ann's enthusiasm more than she'd like to admit.

* * *

Akira recognized the blonde saxophone player immediately. He recalled faces with alarming precision-- not necessarily names, though, so while he was sure she'd been into Leblanc on a number of occasions, it had always been with others, so he'd never had the time to really get to know her on the personal level he was able to achieve with those who came alone.

Someone he'd seen with her at Leblanc joined her on the flat open area of the club that was apparently the stage. With curly, light brown hair that went to her shoulders, the girl sat on the piano bench as she tucked her skirt beneath her legs and stretched before taking her position and resting her fingers gently on the ivory keys. The saxophonist counted them off, and the pianist began, the music filling the room and silencing conversations in an instant.

And then, a few meters in, a voice filled the room, smooth, deep, and passionate.

_ "It was great at the very start: hands on each other. Couldn't stand to be far apart. Closer the better." _

Just as the saxophone began to play, the source of the voice walked out from behind the curtain. Wearing a wine red dress that hung off her shoulders, hugged the curves of her chest and waist, and flared out from the waist, the singer stood tall while the dress on her was short and cute but somehow still sexy and mature.

When the bridge began, the vocalist took front and center stage. Her eyes the very same color as her dress and heels, they pierced right past the lights that should have blinded them and stared straight into the audience. Brimming with pain, the emotion behind the voice spoke directly to the soul, ignoring the barriers of language.

Akira couldn't place what trapped him first: her voice or her beauty. The woman captivated the audience effortlessly, and Akira felt trapped in her presence, thoughts silenced as he processed the spell she weaved through her words.

When the bridge of the song hit, the saxophone began to play, accompanying the voice with a quiet power as the vocalist moved across the stage. Her subtle jewelry caught the light just right and sparkled as she walked; her heels were silent as she moved.

He'd never been quite so taken by someone before, certainly not a musical artist. Artists existed in a world apart from him, a mere barista in a tiny coffee shop in Yongenjaya. The woman on stage existed right in front of him now, but she was clearly meant for better things--bigger things. Hearing the passion in her voice and recognizing the emotion in her expressions as she sang, Akira felt conflicted in her presence, caught between feeling small and empowered.

When the chorus began, her emotions built, her voice rising until she was belting out notes-- the whole room holding their breath as she crooned.

Akira moved to the edge of his seat as if the short distance would bring him closer to understanding anything about her.

How was she still in Yongenjaya?

Why was she playing in a hole in the wall that didn't even have a proper stage?

She deserved more-- so much more. A stage. An audience. The country. The world.

His eyes went wide as she went silent and the saxophone began its own solo, the blonde woman moving to the front as she played. Looking at him and meeting his eyes, the vocalist held his gaze with a small, smug smirk as if she'd sprung some kind of trap and he'd ended up helplessly entangled in it without a clue that as he struggled, he'd only knotted himself even tighter around her finger.

The song finished, and the small jazz bar cheered. Akira only realized then that the room had filled with several people standing against the left wall and in the back. Akira clapped politely, watching the goddess of Yongenjaya carefully.

"Good evening, Yongenjaya."

As the vocalist introduced herself and the others on stage, she smiled warmly, humble as the audience cheered or shouted back to her. The vocalist, Akechi, said a few words about the first song and the next, and as Haru, the pianist, began to play the next song, Akira knew that somewhere along the way, he'd committed. At this point, he'd become invested. He'd stay for the set and, if possible, maybe he could speak to Akechi. Afterward, he could tell her . . .

Well, he could tell her that . . .

* * *

Akechi finished the set with a short giggle of embarrassment, bowing dramatically her hair falling forward and back as she bowed and righted herself. Haru stood up and the three girls joined hands in a bow together before waving to the crowd and heading back behind the curtain.

As soon as the curtain closed, she felt Ann's arms around her, and, soon after, Haru's.

"Chi-chan, that was sooo beautiful! Seriously, like, one of the best sets ever!" Ann cheered, jumping up and down a few times with Akechi still in her embrace.

"That really was incredible, Akechi-san," Haru encouraged, removing herself from Akechi to watch Ann's enthusiasm go too far.

Akechi, smiling all the while, peeled Ann off of her and responded with tired eyes, "thank you, both, but it wouldn't have been possible without the two of you. Thank you so much."

Haru laughed softly, "You needn't be so modest, Akechi-san."

Ann's laugh broke through the curtains as she waved a hand dismissively in Akechi's direction, "Right? You sound so weird when you're being modest."

Akechi put her hands on her hips, her eyes narrowing in annoyance, "Now what is that supposed to mean?"

Ann only laughed more, "That's better. Our Chi-chan has her sweet moments, but she's never modest or humble."

Akechi's shoulders slumped, her expression flattening out as she met Haru's eyes,"Is that true?"

Haru put a hand in front of her mouth and giggled, "It's pretty accurate."

"Ugh, I'm just tired of Yongenjaya."

"Soon, Akechi-san, soon."

"It better be."

"Take Tokyo by storm, Chi-chan!"

"Right," she smiled, her expression fond.

About twenty minutes, like clockwork, most of the customers had shuffled out, leaving only a few stragglers left behind to nurse their whiskey highballs. When the girls walked out from behind the curtains, they planned on sharing a drink together until, that is, Ann spotted the barista from the coffee shop around the corner and practically pounced on him.

"Hey! it's you! From Leblanc!"

Akechi noted immediately that his eyes were on her before they jumped to Ann.

"That's right. Akira." He stood and shook their hands politely, "Thank you for the show Ann-san, Haru-san."

"Thank you for coming," Haru smiled.

"And . . " He faced Akechi directly, but she kept her arms crossed firmly. She saw no reason to be friendly unless it was absolutely necessary.

Ann, of course, with all her sunshine and good intentions, made it absolutely necessary, "Akira-san, this is Chi-chan."

"Nice to meet you, Chi-chan," he offered his hand and she took it with a smile.

"It's Akechi," she replied, guarded. She'd been hit on by too many men, especially after shows, to not be.

In response to her lacking friendliness, the barista just smiled back appearing unaffected. She wasn't sure if that meant he was malicious or just dumb. She sighed and turned in the direction of the bar, "I'm getting a drink."

"Done."

She felt Ann's arm turn her back around in time to see Akira hand Haru a glass. "Thank you, Akira."

"Oh my god, thank you!" Ann beamed and took the next one and then Akechi awkwardly accepted the last one from him, their fingers touching briefly in the exchange.

"Consider it a 'thank you' for the show. I don't think I've ever enjoyed jazz so much." Creepy or genuinely kind? Akechi couldn't tell.

Haru smiled, speaking for all of them to ease them into conversation, "It's not what we want it to be just yet, but we're on our way."

Eventually, they all sat down together, nursing their drinks and familiarizing themselves with cordial conversation. Haru and Ann did most of the talking with Akira answering questions about Leblanc or asking questions about their history in music. Akechi said little, still guarded, but as time went on, she laughed and chimed in as Ann and Haru shared little anecdotes of their time together. Another hour or two had passed before Ann looked at her phone.

"Oh," She jumped up, her arm on Haru to pull her along, "we have to plan with Sae when we're doing our next gig and what our lineup will be. Chi-chan, you stay here."

“What?”

“Akira-san said earlier that he has some connections. Figure them out. You have the best chance. He totally digs you."

“Right . . ." She didn't appreciate being told that right in front of him. Hello, tact.

Akira wasn't even looking at them and was instead smiling into his drink.

When Haru and Ann had taken seats at the bar and were no longer within earshot, Akira spoke, "I didn't really expect any of this tonight."

"What do you mean?" Akechi looked up from her drink. His appearance was nothing to be elated over, but his eyes were another story entirely. Even from behind glasses, there was something about them that looked equal parts mysterious and enticing.

"Enjoying myself. Being . . . completely shocked by you. That sort of thing." And, surprisingly, he didn't appear coy or smug. If Akechi were getting past the notion that it was just a trick of the light, she would actually accept the idea that he was shy and blushing in her presence.

“You didn't believe the rumors,” she guessed. She always kept up to date with what was being said of her. She had to.

“Rumors are rarely true,” he smiled, sweet and clearly enraptured. Akechi almost felt sorry for him, but she was too distracted by how honest he was to feel pity. There was a sort of confidence in the way he spoke, and, as their conversation continued between the two of them, she found herself unable to lump him in with the rest of the men she'd met along the way.

At some point, they'd moved closer together. At some point, he'd taken her hand. At some point, her right hand had ended up on his thigh. At some point, their lips had met briefly and they pulled apart slowly, their eyes searching one another's.

Akechi couldn't remember the last time she'd actually kissed someone. Everything about the encounter screamed logically that it was wrong, but, looking at him, tasting him, it felt so . . . inevitable.

Neither said anything for a moment until Akechi finally admitted, "There's something about you . . ."

Akira, looking more surprised than content, agreed, "I think I know what you mean."

Inevitable. Inescapable. A cycle she'd never find her way out of.

"No, I don't think you do," and when everything returned, Akechi felt her whole body begin to tremble in fear, "This--I—“

"What is it?" 

Vaguely aware that Akira had turned to him, Akechi tried to shake his head but he couldn’t get it to move from the paralysis his shock had put him in, "I'm not--I'm not--"

"Are you okay?" He heard him ask as if Akechi was normal— as if everything they were experiencing was normal and his reaction was entirely out of place.

"Okay?” He tried to ask, wincing at the sound of the voice that came from his mouth, a voice that was not his and had never been his, “Am I okay?" He repeated. "I'm not even me.” His shaking legs, now unbalanced on his heels, carried him up suddenly, and the chair he’d been sitting in fell backward in a clatter to the floor, “I’m the furthest thing from okay,” he said lowly. “I'm not a woman. I'm not some jazz singer. I'm not friends with Takamaki and Okumura. I'm not—I'm not--I'm not even alive! This is all a lie! All of this is wrong! I can't--"

Ann put her hand on his bare shoulder and tried to comfort him and bring him into an embrace, "Chi-chan, hey, calm down. It's okay. It's gonna be--"

Akechi pushed her away and tripped in the direction of the stage away from both of them, “Get off me! We aren't friends! You don't even know me!"

"Akechi?" Ann’s eyes were wide, a hand over her mouth in disbelief.

Akira, concerned but confident, stepped closer to him, hands low as if approaching a frightened animal, "Hey, you don't have to--"

"This is all your fault!" Akechi screamed in a strangled cry, a finger pointed in his direction. It had to be. At this point, far more evidence pointed to Akira being the one in control than Akechi. The beach. This. The train. And what else? When he’d been a slave? What else had they— Had they actually—? No, that had never happened. But had they—?!

Akechi crossed his slender arms in front of his chest and struggled to remain standing, tears falling now from his eyes as he screamed in Akira’s direction, "This is your doing! It must be! You can't keep doing this to me!"

* * *

Akira had never seen someone change so quickly. One minute, they’d been deep in conversation, shyly touching one another, lost in the moment they were sharing and then the next, she placed blame on him for things he didn’t even quite understand. She wasn’t a singer? A woman? Alive? What did any of that mean and why was it his fault?!

"What are you talking about?” He asked evenly, not letting his anger show, “We just met.” He tried to reason with her.

"Wake up!" She screamed, grabbing a bottle from the nearest table by the neck and smashing it against the table’s edge to create some kind of weapon. She’d done it so quickly and with such certainty that Akira was convinced it wasn’t the first time she’d done so.

"Chi-chan, stop it!" Ann yelled, tears threatening to spill from her glossy eyes. She reached out to her only to be pulled back by Haru.

The owner of the bar, a tall blonde woman, walked up beside Akira and spoke sternly towards the vocalist, "Akechi, what's gotten into you?"

"What the hell?” Akechi, with her red eyes blazing, shook her head after making eye contact with the woman, “And Sae-san owns a jazz bar in Yongenjaya? I started a makeshift band with Takamaki and Okumura? What kind of fucked up shit is this?!"

"Akechi, stop,” Sae’s tone grew sharp and uncompromising, but Akechi remained unaffected. She looked to the woman’s friends, “Haru. Ann. Get her out of here.”

The two of them took a step forward together only for Akechi to swing her makeshift blade in their direction wildly.

"Wake up, Akira!" She yelled at him while her focus darted wildly about, ready to strike at anyone that dared get closer to her.

Wake up? Wake up? But he already was awake! What was she talking about? Was she just crazy? But, she seemed so convinced, so sure, that Akira wondered if maybe he was at fault for something though for what, he didn’t know.

"Stop this! You're upsetting everyone here!" Okumura yelled, still holding Ann back and attempting to comfort her at the same time.

Akechi pled, her voice as shaky as her hands as she spoke to him, "Why aren't you waking up? Why aren't you remembering? Akira, please."

Her eyes caught his and held them there. He couldn’t look away, and she, she remained unblinking as she studied him. Tears spilled out from her eyes, but for a long moment, she didn’t make a sound.

"Akira, please--please save me. You said you'd save me.” Her right hand, the one not holding the broken bottle, went to grope at her own chest through her dress as if to infer something, “Look what you did. Why did you do this to me?”

Akira shook his head, trying still to remain calm, "This is the first time we've met."

"It's not!" She screeched back. When he said nothing in return, she kept speaking, "I can't--I can't keep doing this. I can't keep going on like this. You promised me."

Everyone around them made no move to do anything or even to speak. Impossible to tell who was on whose side, the others became a silent audience to the drama that played out before them. Akira continued to try reasoning with him, "I don't know what you're talking about, but I want to help. I do. If I could just--"

He watched Akechi’s lips move, and she whispered something with great difficulty, but it was too soft for Akira to make it out clearly.

Akira struggled with what to do; not only had he never been in a situation like this, but he also had never been so desperate to understand someone. A few minutes ago, he’d connected with her more clearly than anyone he’d met in a long time, but now that connection was not only gone, she didn’t even seem connected to herself. In an instant, she’d completely lost her mind.

“Look you just--"

"Let me die,” she said, her plea louder this time.

Akira went from frustrated to shocked. Why was she saying that and why was  _ asking _ him? He tried to clip his thoughts together into coherent sentences, "That's not going to solve anything. If we--"

"Let me die,” she interrupted, somehow still appearing beautiful even with the hollow despair in her red eyes.

"Ake-"

She raised the broken bottle up to her neck. "Let me die."

"Akechi!" He’d never witnessed anything so gruesome. An imperfect blade, the bottle required several jerks with both hands on it to deepen the cut from one side to another. He ran, catching her in time and falling to his knees to hold her as she bled and sputtered.

He’d seen this before, too, hadn’t he? Their meeting was destiny. Their attraction was inevitable. 

But this?

What was missing?

Why did this keep happening?


	13. Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for your support! I know this is such a weird fic, but I really appreciate the kudos and comments. Like, these comments give me life. Thank you! T- T

When Akechi woke up, he noticed the noise first. When he opened his eyes, he saw the TV was on; he didn't recognize what it what was playing. He didn't recognize the TV, either. Or the room, or the furniture or-- He shifted, realizing his head was resting in a pillow on someone's lap.

"Akira?" He wasn't sure when he'd started calling him by his first name; it just felt wrong doing otherwise. Perhaps it wasn't for the best and he'd end up regretting it later, but for now, he refrained from falling back on old habits. They had experienced too much together to ignore that between them too much had changed for them to return to where they'd been before he'd died and before they'd ended up in the situation they were in now.

Akira looked down at him with a gentle smile, his glasses gone and his eyes clear and honest, "Hey." He slipped his right hand over Akechi's hand that was resting on his stomach and he tangled their fingers together.

Akechi didn't have the strength to say _no_. It felt nice; their hands together felt warm and familiar, so Akechi let it be, even closing his hand into a fist and pulling Akira's hand closer in the process.

Akechi didn't make to get up, and Akira didn't push him away. “Are you . . . aware?” He wasn't sure how to phrase it any longer. In the past, it had been so obvious that they were dreaming, but lately, the dreams had been so detailed. No longer grounded in reality but still built on histories and familiarity, the dreams that they'd shared no longer resembled dreams but instead resembled lives--full lives that always forced their paths to cross. This could be the same as all of the ones before it, or, this could be a moment in which Akechi could finally--

What?

“Of you?” Akira grinned, playful and clearly more comfortable in the unfamiliar setting than Akechi was.

“That you’re dreaming?” Akechi corrected, remaining serious.

Akira's expression shifted, his eyes still clear as everything else around them went blank and unfeeling, “Yes.”

Goro did his best to mirror the same expressionless face, “I’m glad we both woke up this time.”

“We usually do,” Akira replied, his head looking up and relaxing against the couch so that all Goro could see was his chin.

“But not always," Goro reasoned, still unsure of how to feel about their hands together but still not pulling away.

“Yeah.”

“What is this world?” Akechi asked, knowing full well that Akira would know. At this point, he'd become completely convinced that Akira held the sole responsibility for the hell they were experiencing. Of course, he didn't know how or why, but he knew that he endured completely at his mercy.

“From what I’ve gathered from where I'm sitting, we share an apartment and go to university together.”

Akechi noticed the textbooks underneath the table between the couch and the television. He squinted his eyes to see a framed photo of them together at what looked like Leblanc. What Akira said didn't make any sense. How could he tell the apartment was shared? “Oh, like the one where we woke up in bed together?”

“Possibly?”

Akechi sat up, his eyes searching his surroundings. He could see the kitchen, the couch and TV, and a tall table likely to eat at were all in one room. A light curtain obscured the image of a bed and a large windowed door that led to a balcony on the other side of it in the next small room. That meant the bathroom was likely by the front door down the hall. Small. Simple. Lived in. He couldn't imagine them sharing a space like this together; he couldn't imagine them being normal. He couldn't imagine them together, happy. Nothing in his life had been any of those things. And so, Akechi knew things like that weren't meant for him, which was all the more reason to believe that this was nothing but Akira's fantasy being played out in some shared dream. “So this is what you want?” he finally asked.

Akira didn't respond, but Akechi could feel his eyes on him. He noticed the floor lamp that glowed in the corner beside the TV. He saw the artifacts of their history together askew on the entertainment stand. A fake knife. A toy saber. “You want this . . . for us. This is what would make you happy?” He noticed the absence of any sign of a cat and found it strange.

“It would be nice if we could have something like this," Akira admitted, shifting to turn towards him and away from the TV, which suddenly went black without either of them touching a remote.

“You need to make up your mind," Akechi said dryly noticing that they were both in pajamas. Maybe that had been a hint that they lived together? Maybe he was overthinking things.

"Why are you so convinced it's me?" Akira asked curiously, his eyes even more piercing without his glasses on.

Akechi met them straight-on, "From the beginning . . ." He had to gather his evidence, but remembering his argument felt suddenly impossible, "You said . . ." What had it been? On the train, lifetimes ago, Akira had said something that didn't sound like Akira. He'd said something so out of character and it had burned itself inside his mind. "You said you wouldn't mind spending your life in a dream if it was with me."

"But that doesn't mean--"

"It's true." Akira closed his mouth, nothing in his presence revealing that he was prepared to argue or fight with Akechi, so Akechi went on. "And, you have the luxury of saying that because for you, it's a choice. It's not a choice for me. You want to keep me here, don't you?" he accused in a tone that didn't match the weight of his words.

"I don't have any control over that." Akira sounded so honest.

Akechi shook his head, "But you do. You do. All of this is you. You're always the one in control." Both of them had gone still, "Somehow, I don't know how, but you are. I didn't want this. I don't want any of this!" Akechi stared down at the couch a moment, attempting to control himself; nothing could be helped with yelling. The emotions, however, found other ways out, and soon enough, his hands trembled, "It's all you. Don't you hear the things you say? You speak to me like you're--"

Akira's hands were on his, and he leaned in, looking up at him in concern, "Akechi, you need to calm down."

Goro pulled away, nearly falling backward on the couch as he created distance between them, "What does it matter if I'm calm or not?! I'm dead!" And, that was it, wasn't it? The final nail in the proverbial coffin. He didn't exist in the same way Akira did, so all of this . . . these dreams . . . these experiences . . . these emotions . . . none of them mattered in the end because he wasn't alive to truly act on them. "I'm dead, Akira!"

"Stop saying that," Akira warned, his concern shifting to quiet, subtle rage.

Good. Akechi preferred Akira become just as invested as he was-- just as weak, "What, that I'm dead?" He sat up on the couch on his knees, now on the end, "That I died on my father's ship in some kind of twisted suicide because I couldn't face the fact that I'd not only lost to you but that I'd been wrong all this time?"

"Stop," the leader of the Phantom Thieves frowned, and Akechi felt a touch victorious.

"You've trapped me here somehow and now you just . . . Or wait . . . no . . . maybe I was always here to begin with?" Goro's eyes went wide with the epiphany. Why hadn't he thought of that before?

When Akira said nothing, Goro continued, his eyes seeing nothing but the possibility that lie in the theory. "Maybe I was always here. I'm not actually Akechi Goro, am I? I'm just a figment of your imagination. That's it. That must be it. That's how you're able to change me."

"Goro, stop." Akira moved closer to him, concern once more written in his face, "You're the one who needs to listen. You're not making any sense." He reached out to embrace him and Goro stood suddenly, hitting the small dining table in the tiny space that was the apartment they'd found themselves in.

Staring down at him, Akechi narrowed his eyes, "What will happen if I stop playing your game?"

Akira shook his head, "I'm not playing any games."

Akechi ignored him, "What will happen if I don't play along anymore? If I have control-- _real_ control over my own actions, then, what if I stop playing along? What would you do?"

Akira grit his teeth, saying nothing, but looking defiant.

"What would you do to me?" Akechi challenged.

In response, Akira stood up and disappeared behind the curtain, seemingly looking in a closet.

"Where are you going?" Akechi asked, watching him without moving a muscle.

Akira walked right past him towards the door, now wearing a long, gray coat, "I'm going to give you some space; you clearly need it." Akechi heard the shuffle of shoes, the latch on a door, and a loud slam as it closed.

In these dreams, he'd only been alone once before, right? In the crypt? Or no, that white space? He'd found Akira both times. Akira had never left him before, though. He'd never . . . walked away.

"Akira," he called out tentatively as though the man were omniscient. "Akira?" He tried again, louder. "Akira, please come back."

"Hey--" Goro took steps toward the front door, padding softly as he tried to see through the small peephole in the door. He opened the door to see a brilliant city landscape: Tokyo, clearly. Maybe the apartment was somewhere near Sumida since he could make out Skytree. He missed the city. Biking. Maybe he could just--

He stepped outside only to fall back in through the balcony door, landing on the floor with a thud. Of course, he lived in a dream, and within this dream, again, he had no control. Even if he wanted to take his bike out, which, looking now, was parked on the balcony beside the small wash machine, he couldn't if Akira wouldn't let him.

"Akira!" he yelled, standing up in their bedroom. He looked around the room and observed the small pieces of themselves on shelves by the closet and on either side of their bed. He walked over to pick up a photo of them together with the other Thieves. He couldn't remember when they'd taken it. But, he did remember the photo below it. He and Akira had gone to Odaiba together on a date, and Akira had used his camera on the beach that night to create light painting photos. He'd given Goro wings and a halo. He'd never expected Akira to go in to photography, but, from the competitions he'd won in the last three years, he'd proved to him that he'd been meant for it. Besides, Goro was studying law, so if Akira ended up some broke artist, Goro wouldn't mind providing for the both of them. He liked it when Akira depended on him, anyway. He picked up the small octopus plush beside the photo and shook his head. Akira had gotten it for him and made some kind of joke; too much time had passed. He couldn't even recall what the joke had been. Goro fell on the bed behind him, the small plush still in his hand. When would Akira be home, again? He rolled over to his lover's side of the bed and sunk his nose into Akira's pillow. It smelled like him: coffee and earth. Intoxicated by the scent, Goro closed his eyes and reached a hand under his boxers to lazily work on himself. He imagined Akira's lips on his neck, then down his chest, and finally working his cock. He recalled the most recent memory of Akira going down on him in the living room right in the middle of a Skype meeting with some of his coworkers. Fuck, he'd been so hot, smirking up at him while Goro tried not to show anything on his face as they discussed the case. He'd had to make up some kind of excuse suddenly and slam his laptop closed before he'd started moaning from his building orgasm. Leave it to Akira to, after four years, still make their love life interesting.

_'The world has forgotten me.'_

Goro stopped, withdrew his hand and stared blankly at the ceiling.

Again, he remembered the train, the dream that had been too strange to be anything else.

"You said you hadn't," he said to the empty air.

He felt a headache coming on as reality split into facets, too many possibilities to process that only one was true. "Is that it? Is that the only reason I'm still here? I don't exist anywhere else except inside your dream?"

How had he fallen inside it so easily? Was it Akira's fault or his own?

"Akira . . ." he curled inside himself and waited, trying desperately to keep his thoughts focused on reality.

Akira had left him here. This place wasn't real. He was being manipulated.

But, the dream was too tempting.

Akira would be back from work soon. This place was their home. He was loved.

"Akira . . . you can hear me, can't you? Please come back," Goro couldn't tell time here. There were no clocks or phones. He hadn't tried to open the laptop, but he didn't need to check it to know. In this, Akira tortured him. This was a kind of torture, wasn't it? He couldn't place reality. He couldn't place time. He couldn't place his own emotions--even his own existence. Was Akira really doing all of this on purpose?

Was Akira really trying to hurt him?

Was Akira really trying to break his will?

Broken, Goro gave in and waited on the bed with the octopus discarded for the pillow that smelled of Akira. He hugged it close, curling around it as he tried to imagine them together. Happy. What had he said before he left? _"Some space"_? To be alone? Or had he said, _"See you tonight"_? A promise that he'd be home in time for dinner?

No, that couldn't be right. Goro always ate alone because he'd always been alone. Always. In fact, the first time he hadn't been alone in the last several years was since Akira had reached out to him and since he'd joined the other Thieves. Akira kept him from being alone. Akira fought to hold on to him. Akira had saved him from the solitude that suffocated him. So why was he running away from him?

Goro sat up suddenly and screamed in the darkness night had brought, "Akiraaa!"

Wind beat against branches outside. He could hear the steady city traffic.

Nothing else.

He waited.

The sun lit the room.

He waited.

The light disappeared once more.

He waited.

"Please come back . . ."

In the distance, a train raced down tracks. Outside, birds chirped.

Nothing else.

He waited.

"Come back!"

Why had he abandoned him? Why was he like everyone else? Akira was supposed to be different. He said he would save him, right? Save him from-- So then why--? 

"Fine. Fine!" Goro stood up suddenly in the bed, walked off of it, stomped through the living room towards the kitchen, and grabbed a knife taking no time in reflecting on the fact that he knew exactly where they were kept.

"Do you see this?!" he yelled into the emptiness around him. "Akira!" He held the knife up to his throat, "Akira, I’ll do it!"

He could hear his own heartbeat.

Nothing else.

He waited.

"I really will. I know you don’t like it." It was why he'd done it in the last dream, "If you don’t come back, I’ll do it!" But it hurt. He hated it. He pressed the tip of the knife to his skin and winced at the pain in his neck.

He waited.

At the last second, he changed his mind. With the knife in his left hand, he pulled his sleeve and bared his right arm to place the tip of the knife on his wrist. Grunting from the pain, he pressed the knife in and cut up, slow, straight, and stubborn. It hurt, the pain washing over him slowly, nowhere near as immediate as when he cut his own neck. Somehow it felt better. He had time to process it. He had time to know it. His eyes began to water, but he wouldn't cry. The pain was not the point.

"Akira, where are you?!"

Blood flowed freely from the deep wound and dripped down to the floor. Goro sank beside the couch between it and the dining room table. He put the knife in his right hand and watched as how the wound opened up and more blood spilled as his right hand struggled to grip around it.

"I don’t actually want to die," he whispered only to himself. "I’m sorry," he heard himself say the words, but he didn't know what they meant or who they were for.

He pressed the tip of the knife to his left wrist but didn't move, "I don’t want to be alone. Please come back," he dropped the knife, will broken. "Akira . . ." Akechi closed his eyes. He could remember it now. The life they had together. Not just them, but the others, too. They always made an effort to meet every week; they shared protected time every Friday at Leblanc even after all of these years and despite their very different, very busy schedules. They'd grown so close in that time. They'd forgiven him in that time, but Akechi had never quite forgiven himself. Some nights, he would be unable to sleep and he'd cry, apologizing to Akira, to the others, to his victims, to their loved ones knowing full well only Akira could hear him. And, Akira would hold him from behind, run his fingers through his hair and whisper the same mantra into his ear over and over again, _'I love you. We all love you. You deserve our love. You deserve to be loved. You are good and you are brilliant and you deserve to live.'_

**I love you. We all love you. You deserve our love. You deserve to be loved. You are good and you are brilliant and you deserve to live.**

"I love you. We all love you. You deserve our love. You deserve to be loved. You are good and you are brilliant and you deserve to live."

"Akira?" he realized then that he was being held, his lover's arms around him supporting his weight with his back against his chest.

"You’re right that I don’t like it." Akira put his right hand on Akechi's injured arm and pulled up along his skin to reveal unmarred flesh, free of blood or pain. 

Goro watched, silent, trying to process where the magic trick fit in with everything else. "You shouldn’t have left," he finally said.

"You shouldn’t do something like that just for attention," Akira bit back.

"You came back. That’s proof isn’t it?" Goro pulled away from his grip and turned toward him, "And now this--" he bared the arm that, seconds ago, had been bleeding out, "This, too." He put it down and stared into empty space, piecing everything together and uncharacteristically sharing his thoughts aloud, "I used to have control but I don't anymore--not of anything."

Akira said nothing. He took his hands and stood up to lead Goro back to the couch.

"This is your dream," Goro insisted without any passion behind it, "It has always been your dream."

Akira still didn't reply as they sat down, and, instead of looking at him, he just pulled his knees in up to his chin.

Goro wouldn't let it go. In his mind, saying nothing just meant Akira was admitting to the guilt, the truth he couldn't verbalize. So, if Goro's theory was true, there was only one thing left to determine, "Am I real?"

"Yes," Akira replied immediately, turning toward him and opening up.

"How do you know?"

Akira admitted slowly, seemingly transparent in thought, "I can never predict how you’ll act."

"It’s a plausible theory," Goro reflected.

Akira, gently, took Goro's head in his hands and sat up on his knees to kiss him once on his cheek, then his jaw, and, as his hands fell down his arms, he began to kiss his neck. "Watch a movie with me?" he whispered between kisses.

Akechi contemplated it, his body growing warm from the simple touches. He couldn't name a feeling to what it was that he was processing then. Akira could be so kind; he could touch him in ways he didn't deserve. He could lie just as easily as Goro could. "And pretend we’re okay? Pretend we have some kind of normal life together?" That would be a lie, too. Akira hadn't found his body, right? At this point, there was no hope that he was alive. Choosing to spend his time with a dead man, what had Akira sentenced himself to?

"Yes."

But it was what Akira wanted.

And, in the world Akechi had found himself in, Akira got what he wanted.

" . . . Only if I get to pick the movie."

"Deal."


	14. Unfamiliar Ceiling 3

"How do you do this every day?" Goro sat at the bar of Leblanc with a glass of iced coffee and a book in front of him. Currently, there were no customers in the small fifteen-seat cafe, which, turns out, was not unusual.

"What?" Ren was cleaning the siphon to prepare it for a new roast. His long fingers handled the delicate glass carefully. "Cafe Leblanc is fun."

Goro rolled his eyes as he watched him, straightening his back with posture in mind as he held the book he was reading open in his left hand, "You have maybe a customer an hour. _Maybe._ And those kids just study here because they think being in the presence of a haibane is good luck."

Ren dried the glass with a cloth and set the siphon up once more. He shrugged at Goro's argument, "Yeah, being a haibane does bring in customers in search of divine intervention."

Goro noticed he was winning this argument, which, to be fair, was rather easy, but also actually meant he was discrediting Ren's talents and employment entirely. He needed to make up for it quick, "But your coffee is actually quite good."

"This is the oldest coffee shop in town. Have you tried anyone else's?"

Too late; Ren suffered from a damaged ego Goro couldn't do anything for, "Well, no."

"Then how can you compare?"

He realized he'd walked right into that trap. "That's fair. . . Wait a minute, whose side are you on?" Ren only smiled, so Goro tried again, "I have nothing to compare it, too, no, but it feels  . . . inviting and familiar . . . your kindness is in each cup."

"Did you really just say that?"

Goro felt his face go warm, and he put his open book to his nose to hide himself, "Don't tease me when I'm trying to compliment you!"

"Auu, you're blushing." He felt Ren attempt to pull the book away, so instead of being difficult, Goro complied. Ren's eyes were instantly fond, his own cheeks pinking lightly, "You're so cute when you're blushing."

"Enough," Goro warned, attempting to sound stern when all he could manage was something short of a whine behind his smile.

Ren chuckled and let go of the book, shifting his weight to lean over the bar, "I like Leblanc's atmosphere, even more-so when you're here bumming free coffee."

"Cooking food and brewing coffee are not for me." The image of shattered plates came to mind. He'd basically been Cafe Leblanc's first indoor natural disaster. Sae had scolded Ren in his place, and he didn't want to be on the receiving end of a similar lecture should he make the same mistake twice.

"So you've demonstrated," Ren teased. He relaxed against the wood and let his chin rest in his hand, his elbow on the bar, "You seem to do well with the kids."

Goro worked for over a week now with Karoi in helping with the children's lessons, getting them to and through meals (cooked by Ren), and putting them to bed. "They like me," he smiled, pleased with himself. At first he'd been intimidated, but after receiving both Karoi's praise and the affection of the children, he'd made it his sworn duty to help the teacher whenever necessary, which, unsurprisingly, meant he found himself with the children for several hours a day. Someone who wasn't a haibane would come and assist throughout the day as needed with meals and what-not, and Futa, the eldest child who never left her room, would help them in the morning, but aside from that, the responsibility of raising the five children rested on Karoi's shoulders. The more Goro assisted her, the more he realized that the other two old feathers, Ren and Sae, could have done more, but he had determined long ago the hierarchy of the group, and if Karoi wasn't saying anything to Sae, then he would likewise keep his mouth shut.

"And you like them?" Ren asked, his eyes twinkling under the poor lighting of Leblanc. The cafe resembled a basement after the sun went down around six; Goro gathered that was why it closed at seven.

"I feel . . . invested." That word best described what he'd recently decided. "I'm not sure why. I just . . . want them to be happy." He closed his book on the counter as if to finalize his decision. His work had been decided.

"I like it when you say things like that." Ren smiled, looking up from where he was positioned still leaning over the bar.

"Oh?" Goro quirked an eyebrow expectantly, waiting for Ren to go on.

Ren righted himself, and, without any warning, took both of Goro's hands in his, putting his long fingers over Goro's closed hands. With a pleading voice and wide, innocent eyes, he asked, "Be the father of my children?"

"You wish," Goro scoffed and pulled his hands free from Ren's, the other's display having little effect on him aside from a deep blush to his cheeks.

"I do," Ren replied, proud of his work.

"Ren?"

"Futa! Hey!" Ren's attention instantly snatched away, he motioned for the girl with the long, orange hair, to come sit down at the bar and join them.

Goro had never seen her before. All bones and skin, she looked older than they'd said she was, so he recognized her only from voice alone, "Oh, hello, pleased to meet you. I'm--"

"Goro." She cut him off and offered no opportunity for him to speak, "Yeah. I live here." Her tone told him that she wanted nothing to do with him and her crossed arms and ruffled feathers did the same. He'd never met a haibane that wasn't at least curious about him just because he was new; being ignored was not something he was used to.

He put a smile on his face in response to her curt response and made sure not to let it falter even for a second, "Sorry. Thank you for your help with the young feathers. Having them ready in the morning for lessons saves Karoi-sensei a lot of time."

Futa barely looked at him, her voice a firm monotone, "They're like my siblings. I've done this for a year."

Goro smiled still, "Right, sorry. You're right. Still, your help is appreciated." Goro had only been at Leblanc for just over a month and he'd only been assisting with the children for a week, so he understood what she was getting at.

"It's not for you," she emphasized her point.

"Futa?" Ren interrupted.

"Ren," she addressed him directly, focused on the other old feather. Her tone was suddenly devious, playful, even, "Pancakes."

Ren beamed at her, "Of course, princess, but only if you eat at the bar. Sae yelled at me a solid ten minutes last time I let you take food upstairs."

"But Ren," she sniffled, clearly faking it.

"I don't make the rules," he shrugged before turning his back to both of them and heading further into the kitchen to begin cooking.

Futa moved around Goro silently and sat two seats away from him so that an entire seat was empty between them.

Goro wasn't used to being hated, or, at least, he didn't like it, so, in an attempt to make things right, he spoke again, turning towards her with a practiced smile, "Futa, I heard you're an avid reader. I've been to the library in town, and I'm currently reading this book here, but I don't like it much. What kinds of books do you read? Maybe you can recommend some to me?"

"Ren?" she turned her head away from Goro and looked at Ren's back.

Ren didn't even look up from his work, "Futa, we celebrated your birthday two months ago. You're thirteen. You don't need a translator anymore."

Goro panicked, which drove him to not think through his words and ask something obvious, "Oh, I'm sorry. Do you not speak--"

"She speaks our language just fine," Ren cut him off. "She's just shy. It'll take time for her to warm up to you, but she will."

"Don't tell him what I will or won't do," Futa huffed, her wings stretching in her annoyance.

"Oh?" Ren finally looked up from the pan to eye her mischievously, "You're going to tell him yourself?"

Only silence followed as she practically closed in on herself.

"I like stories with heroes," she told the bar, her forehead still glued down to the wood with her halo knocking gently against it.

Goro recognized her efforts, "That sounds perfect. You don't have to talk to me about it, but if you perhaps had the time to write down a few recommendations, I would deeply appreciate it. I can look for them on my own at the library."

Futa nodded, lifting her head up slowly.

"Pancakes for the princess." Ren put a short stack in front of Futa.

"And the prince." And another, in front of Goro.

Goro shook his head, "Ren, you didn't need to make me these. I'm not even hungry."

"But they smell great, don't they?" he leaned over the bar and handed Goro a fork, "You want to try them, don't you?"

Instead of admitting the affirmative to both of those questions, Goro asked, "How do you eat them?"

Ren grinned and grabbed his own fork and a knife from somewhere behind the bar. He easily cut across one side and divided it in half making four odd triangles. He forked one and dipped it into the syrup that had puddled on one side of the plate, "You cut into them like so . . . take a bit of syrup and--" He held the piece of sweet bread up in front of Goro's mouth with a grin.

"You're going to feed it to me?"

Ren's head instantly fell, "You never let anything romantic happen between us," he whined into the bar.

Goro straightened his back and set down his fork to put his hands in his lap, his face pinking lightly, "How is treating me like a baby romantic?"

Ren looked up again, shifted so that his free hand was holding his head to look up at Goro, "But it's like when people feed each other cake on their wedding day."

"People do that here?"

"Yeah, it's a tradition."

Goro picked up his fork hesitantly, "Then shouldn't I be doing the same for you?"

Their eyes met and suddenly, the distance between them felt so short. The music from the record player had stopped. The light from outside had gone dim. The air tasted stale, dry, and desperate. Goro marveled at how Ren's eyes never appeared normal, how, depending on the moment or lighting or mood, they'd always represent some kind of storm of contradictions, pleasant and beautiful, strong and unending.

A cat meowed, and the spell broke, both of them looking toward the source. Morgana, the cat that lived in Leblanc that Ren proclaimed as his, was, yet again, on the counter.

"Mona-chan, you can't be on-"

He hopped off and scampered beneath Goro's chair.

"Oh, Futa left." Goro noticed.

Ren deflated, the pancake still uneaten on his fork, "Damn it. Sae's going to kill me." He set the fork down and removed his apron as he came around the bar to head upstairs to find Futa.

"Wait," Goro grabbed his arm, as he turned away, but just as the plea escaped him, he dropped his arm suddenly.

Ren seemed to understand because he crossed the short distance to be at Goro's side, picked up his fork, and waited, smiling slyly, for Goro to do the same. Looking away for only a moment, Goro forked the sweet treat onto his own utensil and held it up, his eyes stubbornly meeting Ren's and then softening instantly upon doing so.

Wordlessly, they fed each other the pancake, Goro's eyes going closing as the fork left his mouth. It tasted much sweeter than he'd been expecting, and the bread was fluffy and airy, almost like a sponge.  He opened his red eyes just in time to see Ren close the distance between them, Ren's warm tongue on his bottom lip licking at syrup that had escaped the corner of his mouth. Goro froze in shock as Ren continued and the lick became a timid kiss, and then another one, more centered. And another. Ren's eyes opened, silently imploring Goro to accept him. They stared, eyes searching in silence, each of them desperate to know what the other was thinking.

Goro finally admitted, pulling away slightly to speak, "I wanted to be that person. Since the very beginning, I wanted to be the person you were waiting for."

"You are," Ren replied, eyes fond.

Goro's mouth opened to speak but nothing came out.

Ren smiled, "I knew it, since the beginning. _You are_."

Ren leaned in over him, his fork discarded so that he could properly embrace him, and, within a second, their lips met, gentle, then hungry, tasting something sweet and familiar.

For Goro, this was his first kiss, so when it came so easily, so naturally, he immediately fell victim to the gentle touches the other seduced him with. He felt hands on his back between his wings, in his hair, on his neck, down his chest, on his hips--always moving and exploring him. He tried to return the affection, opening his mouth wider, reaching further inside with his tongue, moaning his pleasure, but even as he returned the affection and so much seemed to fall into place, he couldn't let go of that feeling that none of this . . . that no amount of affection was meant for him.

 

_You're cursed._

_You're not meant to be loved._

_You've stolen from others._

_You don't deserve this. You don't deserve him. You don't deserve family, love, or acceptance._

 

The feeling had taken on his own voice. He gently pushed Ren away, tears threatening to spill from his eyes.

"What? What is it? Should I not have--?"

"No, it's not you," Goro whispered, his head down, unable to meet gray eyes.

"I'm not supposed to remember anything about my life before this, right?"

" . . . " Ren was quiet too long before responding, "That's right."

"Then why can't I let go of this guilt?"

Ren didn't meet his eyes, but instead, picked up his fork, and fed him more pancake.

* * *

"Goro is doing well with the kids?" Ren picked up around the room, a dust rag in one hand and articles of dirty laundry in the other.

"Perfect. They've really taken to him." Karoi was sitting at her desk in her room reviewing a textbook to prepare for lessons the next day. She didn't even look up when Ren had broken their intimate silence. They'd known each other for nearly five years; their time spent alone was always like this-- easy and comfortable.

"I'm glad," he replied, tossing the laundry into the hamper and directing his attention to the bookshelf to pick items up and dust beneath them. He remembered getting her the shell from the marketplace about a year after he'd been in the town of Palace. It was from a place called 'ocean'. No one, including the humans that lived in Palace, knew where 'ocean' was. After getting it for her, they'd spent days at the library, ignoring their respective jobs, to find information about it. They'd only learned that 'ocean' was made of water and that it was a place bigger than anything else in the world. Neither of them believed it because nothing was bigger than the sky.

He'd always been getting her into trouble back then.

"And you have, too?" she asked, snapping him from his reverie.

"It's impossible not to; he's gorgeous," he laughed and set the shell back down. He knew it wasn't common for men to like other men, but Karoi had never faulted him for it, so he was comfortable talking to her about it.

"About that . . ." Karoi punctuated the request for his attention by slamming the textbook closed. Ren turned to her and blinked. She was smirking at him with her brown eyes bright behind long lashes and her dress partially unbuttoned to expose the curve of her breasts. He'd seen her disheveled on more than one occasion, but her expression was something he was altogether unfamiliar with.

"Karoi?" he tried, dropping the dust rag when she stood up.

"Am I not beautiful, too?" she all but pouted, pushing him onto her bed and crawling over him, her dress falling off her shoulder to expose bare skin.

Ren blinked, sure she was messing with him, "Y-you know I think you're stunning, sensei, but teachers, no matter how sexy, are off-limits," he grinned, trying not to notice where her legs and hands had ended up.

"Be serious, Ren," she moved his hand to her lips and kissed his fingers, "I care about you." Her brown eyes looked up at him, pleading, "What am I missing?"

Ren blinked, surprised by how far she'd gone for a joke. He gulped, trying to keep up, "What? Karoi, you can't mean--"

Her left hand went to his cheek as she leaned over him, her brown eyes still pleading, "I love you. I always have. But you've never noticed. I know you don't feel the same way now, but do you think, with time, you and I--" She leaned in, their lips nearly touching.

Ren finally regained control and pushed her away gently, his tone serious, "Karoi, I'm sorry I never noticed."

Her head hung and her body shook, "It's okay." He realized tears were wetting his shirt, "We can start now."

Ren felt a wave of regret wash over him. How had he never noticed? She had always been willing to do so much for him. She'd found him and cared for him, despite not being much older than him, and she'd always been there for him. Even when he'd tried to scale the wall, she was the one who had been willing to help him. She had always been willing to sacrifice anything she had in order to make him happy. Had she been suffering alone all of this time? But now . . . To lie to her would be even worse. She deserved the truth and the truth was that he'd already decided. He'd already made his decision on who it was that he had been waiting for, "No, I'm . . . I found the person I've been waiting for. I know it shouldn't make any sense but I love him. I do. I can't . . . betray that." He gently moved away from her, her hands in his as she continued to cry.

"Your true love?" she managed, still not looking up but allowing him to slip from her grasp.

"That's right," he replied.

"How can you be sure?"

He tried sounding honest, "I technically can't, I guess, but, when our eyes meet, I just . . . know . . . I know that I'm meant to love him. I know I'm meant to save him." That sounded right out loud.

She pulled away from him suddenly, wiped her face with the sleeve of her dress, and stood up beside her bed, "Oh, good." She buttoned her dress up with a smile on her face.

"Wait, what?" Ren sat up, confused.

Karoi winked, "I had to make sure you were absolutely certain." She reached down and pulled his left cheek, "Looks like you are."

Ren batted her hands away and massaged the left side of his face, "Wait, all of that was just an act?"

She grinned and turned around to sit back at her desk, opening her textbook with a definitive plop.

"Karoi!" Ren stood up as if to challenge her, his face now a dark shade of red, "You--I can't believe you just--"

She rolled her eyes at his display and waved him off, "Oh, get over it, _maid_ ; I thought you were here to clean my room."

Ren shook his head, rubbing at his cheeks as if to rub away his embarrassment, "I'm going to get you back for this, sensei." He promised, mischief in his tone.

"Oh, I'm sure, honey," she batted her eyelashes.

"I had no idea you were such a good actor," he picked up the dust rag, trying to appear fully recovered.

"I'm just full of surprises, dear," she winked.

"You're going to regret this," he blushed still, going back to his work of cleaning her room.

Karoi laughed, "The man picking up my dirty underwear is threatening me."

"Like I'm going to be intimidated by a woman who wears granny panties." He stretched the pink high-waisted underwear out in front of him.

Karoi went red, "Hey, that's going too far!"

Satisfied that he had gained the upper hand, Ren continued, "We could hang these from a tree and use them as a swing for the young feathers!" He made for the door.

"Ren, where are you going with those?" She bolted up, her desk chair falling behind her.

"Granny panties!" he yelled as he ran down the hallway.

"Ren!"

* * *

"It's raining pretty hard." Goro stared out the circular window at the rain coming down. Ren's room was the attic, technically high up enough to be a third floor of Leblanc. From the window, he could see the woods past the west side of town. It had been raining for five days now. It had also been five days since that night at the playground, and he'd been unable to get the image of Karoi's fading halo out of his head.

_'Did Ren tell you? All haibane have a given name and a true name. I remembered my true name today.'_

Goro put his hand on the glass. The condensation connected him to the cold rain outside. He hoped Karoi wasn't out there somewhere in the rain--alone. Her revelation had stirred inside him too many questions about his own dream. If her cocoon dream had been about how she'd died, then what did that tell him about his own? A loud noise? And why had she wanted to tell only him about her name? Why hadn't she told Sae or Ren? Why had she gone missing today? Was it fair, if she were in danger now, to tell Ren about what she'd said and what he'd seen? Goro's forehead fell against the glass and the window fogged from his breath. Since that day they'd kissed in the cafe, he'd moved into the attic with him. They'd seamlessly created a living space together, Goro's few essentials making a home beside Ren's. They'd been sleeping in the same bed even, holding one another as they fell asleep. It all felt so surreal, like everything leading up to it was the dream, and now, he was trapped inside some alternate reality where he was loved and cared for, where he had a family, potentially even a lover, and he could--

"I'm sure Karoi is fine." Ren interrupted his thoughts from the bed, a book in his hands that he'd been reading for last two days at Goro's suggestion, "She can take care of herself."

"Yeah, you've said that," Goro lifted his head, still looking out at the town of Palace, at the woods, and at the walls beyond them. Even from the attic window, there didn't appear to be anything on the other side of the walls.

_'It's good to know that the children will be in good hands.'_

Goro stepped backward, away from the glass.

"Goro?" Ren asked carefully, concerned.

He tried to word what he'd seen properly, but it didn't seem real. He'd never seen anything like it, "The woods out to the West . . . the birds  . . . they all--" All of them had left at once, the sky going dark with black feathers as they escaped the woods into the sky.

"It's just the lightning," Ren dismissed his concern, nearly agitated for a reason Goro couldn't place, "Come away from the window and let me hold you."

As tempting as the invitation was, Goro couldn't look away from the woods. Something was there. Something he couldn't name.

His eyes went wide, his heart freezing still as he watched a column of light go up from the trees and into the sky. When it faded, he breathed, still not looking away when he spoke, "Ren?"

"What is it?" he asked, setting aside his book and moving to the edge of the bed.

Goro must have said something in his body language to garner such a response. He tried speaking again, tried explaining what he'd seen, "There was a light that traveled just now from the trees to the sky."

"You mean lightning?" Ren asked carefully.

Goro couldn't look away from where he'd seen the column of light, "No, it was different."

"What?" Ren moved suddenly, crossing the distance between them in a breath, turning Goro by the shoulder so that he was facing him, "What did you see?"

"In the Western woods . . ." Goro had never seen Ren angry, or no . . . scared.

"You saw it?" he asked, voice nervous, careful.

Goro's eyes widened to take in the answers to his questions all at once spoken through Ren's gray eyes. Ren really was scared. Goro had made a mistake. He should have said something. About the dream. About the name. About the halo and everything else. About Karoi. "What was it?"

Ren's eyes searched his only a moment before he let him go and turned his back to him, "Shit! I have to get the others!" He grabbed his coat.

"What was it?" Goro asked again, but when Ren said nothing and continued to prepare to leave, he begged for an answer, "Ren? Ren!"

The barista's face clear of the fear from seconds prior, he turned to him with a gentle smile, "Hey, I'm sorry." Ren kissed his cheek and Goro held his breath, "Sorry, hey, look, can you stay with the children until the storm passes? I have to get to the office to find Sae."

Goro stood awestruck. Was it that Ren had control over his emotions or was he just that much of an expert at lying? "I will." he nodded, trying to catch up and somehow be helpful, "I will if you tell me what it was."

Ren shook his head, "It . . . it's been a long time since it's happened but . . ."

"Just tell me," Goro insisted, "I can tell you're upset. Why are you hiding it from me?"

" . . . Her day of flight," Ren held back a sob, shuddering after having said it aloud. When he lost his footing, Goro caught him, holding him close as they fell to their knees on the attic floor.

Ren shook his head against Goro's shoulder before finally saying, "I-I have to go get Sae."

Goro massaged circles into his back, trying feebly to calm him, "It's okay. If she already--"

"No!" Ren pushed him away, not yelling, but still sounding stubborn and aggressive, "Maybe there's time!"

"Ren?" Goro had never seen him like this. He thought that if they were meant to be, it meant he'd know the answers. He'd know how to make Ren happy, no matter what. But, here Ren was, clearly in pain, and Goro didn't even know where to start. He had no idea what to do or what the right thing to say was. All he could do was stare, helplessly lost.

"Maybe I can stop her!" Ren insisted, taking off out of the attic door, down the stairs and the hall.

Goro ran to catch up, "Ren!"

As he passed the girls' room on the second floor, Makoto peeked out from behind the open door of their room, "Goro?"

He stopped, taking a deep breath to still his composure for her sake. He wasn't going to help Ren like this; it would be best if he just did what was asked of him. When he knelt down to be Makoto's height, the child went on, "Shiho is crying, so I think Ann is gonna cry, too."

Goro took her right hand in his gently, smiling calmly to try and relax her, "May I come in?"

"I heard Ren yell," Makoto replied, her round eyes searching his.

"We got into an argument over adult matters, but don't worry. He's fine. I'm okay, too. I'm going to stay with you until the storm is over, okay?"

The explanation had satisfied Makoto because she nodded her head after a quick moment of consideration.

Before he went in, he called inside, "Futa, is it okay?" They hadn't met again since the time they'd seen each other more than two weeks ago in the cafe. He couldn't believe it had already been that long since he'd started the relationship he had now with Ren.

" . . . it's fine."

"Are the boys awake?" Goro walked in, closing the door quietly behind him. He noticed the two bunk beds against each wall, the single window that shed dim light from the storm over a large desk, and the lantern in the middle of the room, glowing warm light that spread around them to light two shiny faces huddled in one bed and a pair of feet on a top bunk.

"Yusuke is," Makoto answered, going to Shiho and Ann's side in the bottom bunk below Futa.

Goro moved to the floor on the right wall that connected the children's rooms together, "We can open the door to stay together if you like until the storm passes."

"Like a sleepover party?" Ann asked.

"Kind of, but no staying up late?" Goro offered.

"Okay," she complied along with the others. Goro unlocked and opened the door to see that both Yusuke and Ryuji were awake, both in their pajamas and both waiting to join them. When he smiled knowingly at them, they both ran around him to join the girls on the bed, fussing immediately over Shiho, who was crying quite steadily into Ann's chest.

Goro shut the door and walked over as well, sitting on the floor beside the bed, "Hey, Shiho."

"Goro-nii, the thunder is scary!" she squealed, screaming into Ann's chest when it struck again.

Goro leaned over to pet her hair, his voice gentle, "Am I scary?"

She looked up, surprised by the question, "No."

"Since my name is Goro, I can tell you a secret about thunder," he offered, his mind attempting to piece together a story on the fly.

"Really?" she blinked, wiping her tears with the sleeve of her nightgown.

"Of course," he held his arms out and she moved to get off the bed, sitting in his lap while the others moved around the lantern in preparation for some kind of unspoken story time. Meanwhile, Futa listened intently from the top bunk, her pen ready to take notes.

Goro, doing his best to be convincing, told them a story of two brothers, the god of lightning and the god of thunder and how they often got into arguments over who was more fearsome. Somehow, putting a personality behind the natural forces made them less terrifying, and soon, Ann and Shiho were acting out the brothers' antics as Makoto and Futa cheered them on and Yusuke drew them. Ryuji, at some point, had fallen back asleep in Ann's bed.

It wasn't until they were all asleep that Goro looked out the window of the girls' room. He couldn't see the woods from there. He could only see the empty, wet streets of Palace that he had become so familiar with. He'd only been here almost two months. It hadn't been enough time to fill Karoi's shoes. How would they tell the kids? They would be so devastated. And Ren . . .

He could remember the look in his eyes, how stern his tone had been. Surely he wouldn't take it well, either.

And him?

Karoi had taught him so much in such a short amount of time. She'd been so wise for her age, and seemed to see everything that was going on in the house . . . especially what was developing between him and Ren. Who would he talk to now? He had Ren but telling him how he felt scared him. What if he was just a replacement for the person Ren wanted? What if he was just seeing what he wanted to see in their time together? He'd been unable to help him hours ago; if he were really who Ren had been waiting for, then wouldn't he have handled it better--known what to say at least?

"Hey, Goro," Futa whispered from the top bunk.

"Futa, you're awake." He shifted from his position against the drawers of the desk, stretching his legs after they'd fallen asleep.

She began to crawl quietly down the ladder from the top bunk, "It's okay. The others are still sleeping."

Goro didn't understand what she was saying, and he understood even less when she came to sit beside him on the floor, their arms touching.

"The kids like you," she whispered, pulling her legs up close to her chest, "What you did earlier for Shiho was pretty cool."

" . . . Thank you," he replied carefully.

Futa spoke into her knees, her words muffled, "Sensei . . . she . . . she's gone, isn't she?"

Goro knew the answer, but he struggled to say it, " . . . I-well, I mean she--"

Futa looked up at him, her eyes wet behind her glasses, "I'm not a child. You can be honest with me."

Goro took a deep breath and released it slowly to buy himself some time before he replied earnestly, "I saw a light in the Western Woods. Ren thinks it may have been her  . . ."

"If I cry, do you promise not to tell Ren?" her eyes pleaded with him.

" . . . Sure."

She moved to lean into him, her face against his chest. He put his arm around her and pulled her close. Within seconds, she had buried herself in his chest and begun to sob, muffled, restrained, quiet, but relentless. Trying to remain strong, he pet her head gently as she cried, never pulling away or saying a word. Together like that, sleep took them.

* * *

"Did Ren tell you? All haibane have a given name and a true name. I remembered my true name today." Karoi's eyes were on the children as they played on the playground in the park a few blocks from Leblanc. They always played just after the sun went down when the villagers had all gone inside. Goro still didn't understand why the young feathers weren't allowed to play with the human children, but he chalked it up to being another rule that made little sense.

Haibane were only allowed to live in certain buildings in town with other haibane. Haibane were only allowed to wear the clothing humans threw away. Haibane children were only allowed to play in the park when the human children weren't using it. It was all the same mentality. Haibane were second to the humans that lived in Palace. Yet, despite that, in the short time that he'd been there, he'd already seen too many humans make exceptions for the haibane. Humans acted too often out of pity for the creatures that inhabited the town. At the thrift store, the shopkeeper had fixed Goro's clothes for free so that he could wear them out. At the marketplace, Goro had been forgiven easily for speaking during a visit from the toga, a time in which no one was allowed to speak. The lady at the bakery had given Goro free food to bring back to the young feathers twice already. It felt strange. Goro didn't want the charity of the humans; he didn't want to be treated differently. And, on top of that, he was sure that he most certainly didn't deserve it.

"You remembered it?" If what Karoi was saying was true, that meant that the other haibane did have memories of their time before Palace. They had memories, however vague, of their life before now. So then why, why had Ren lied so blatantly? Wasn't it obvious that he remembered something if he'd been waiting for his true love all of this time? Was remembering your dream different from remembering your life? And if it was, how was it different?

"I had my dream again this morning," Karoi replied, her eyes still on the children. They were playing tag, but Ryuji kept tagging the person who had just tagged him, much to everyone's frustration--especially Makoto who had been insisting 'no tag backs' for half an hour now.

"Your cocoon dream?" He'd been told that that was how haibane arrived in the town of Palace. They started from a small sprout that grew into a cocoon that, eventually, the haibane would break free from, like a baby chick hatching from an egg. He'd never seen a cocoon, including his own, so it was difficult for him to imagine it properly.

"Yes," she nodded thoughtfully and added, "My name is Karoi which means 'to float' because in my dream, I was floating in the air."

"From your tone, I suspect there was more to it," he calculated.

She closed her brown eyes to recall the images she'd seen, "I don't remember what I was doing, but I remember being exhausted, tired from working. I wasn't floating in the air. From some great height, I had fallen. I was falling." She opened her eyes again.

Goro watched her smile slowly, her eyes glassy.

"My true name is Karoshi-- to die from overwork."

"How do you know?" he asked carefully.

"It's strange. It's as if, now that I remember the entirety of my dream, it's the only thing I do know for certain."

It didn't sit right with Goro. Karoi was a strong-willed person who always stood up for the children and fought for them to have a life as close to normal as possible. She wasn't one to give up, but what she was claiming . . . it sounded to him like she had died from suicide. Sure, it could have been that she'd passed out from exhaustion and fallen, but it was more likely that she had . . .

Were the dreams about how they'd died? The haibane dreamt of their last memory, their death, in their cocoon? If that were true, then--

"It's rare, isn't it," he asked carefully, "for a haibane to remember their true name?"

Karoi nodded, still watching the children, "Most haibane never learn them."

"Sensei, you should tell the others," he suggested. He couldn't speculate all of this on his own. If there were more people piecing the puzzle together, then surely they'd come to the final answer faster. If he had more experienced haibane helping him understand, then he would be able to discern what the cocoon dream actually meant, right? It wasn't right for Karoi to come to all of these conclusions on her own.

"It's better I don't, but I wanted to tell you," she finally looked at him, smiling.

"Why?" he didn't understand why he deserved knowing over Ren. It was his first thought. Wasn't she close to Ren? Didn't they share something untouchable?

Karoi giggled as if his expression or question had caught her by surprise, “You’re finally here--the person Ren has been waiting for all this time.”

"Goro! I need help on this part!" Makoto was trying to read a book in the light of the street lamp after having given up on playing tag with others.

Goro called back to her, "Thank you for advocating for yourself, Makoto. I'm coming." But first, he needed to resolve this issue with Karoi. She needed to tell the others. He needed help in solving this mystery of her true name.

She grinned at him, "It's good to know that the children will be in good hands." Apparently, she was done explaining herself.

"Karoi?" He questioned her as he stood up, his eyes snapping to her halo as the light from it appeared dim for a moment, fading out before glowing once more.

"Goro!" Makoto called.

He turned in the direction of the child, "Coming!" he yelled. He looked back at Karoi to see her smiling still, her halo appearing normal in the light of the street lamp. She motioned with her hands for him to go, and so he did, without looking back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The last section of this chapter is out of order.  
> Ahh, no beta, so forgive me if there were 100 errors.


	15. Past and Present - Interlude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry in advance; this is a disorganized mess but the weird shifts, even in tense, are intentional. ~~I wrote about some of my greatest fears for this chapter, so it got difficult for me to proofread parts of it, and I just became tired /read mixture of lazy and disturbed/ and gave up. I hope it is nice and disturbing for you, too.~~  
>  Enjoy?

Coffee beans grounded into bitter dust as he turned the crank in a steady rhythm. Grinding coffee beans by hand took more time and effort than what Goro had been prepared to wait for the first time, but instead of getting lost in thoughts that pressed against the front of his forehead in a migraine, he focused on the steady purr of the archaic machine that the man continued to toil over. He noticed that in the cafe owner's other hand was a watch and that he was keeping time for how long the beans were ground, an extra unnecessary step that could have been avoided entirely if the man just used an electric grinder. Goro watched the old man's hand continue to swing in circles until finally, it stopped and he pocketed his watch into his green apron.

The bubbles in the water that were boiling over the open flame several seats down from him popped and sang a quiet soprano. Given something new to focus on while the cafe owner did his work, Goro, from his distance, watched as the bubbles that were once so small began to pop and change, growing larger and larger as they erupted from the base where the flame licked the glass. The bubbles popped desperately at the surface, never quite managing escape from the heat. Eventually, only a few bubbles popped in a steady bass, and the cafe owner placed the siphon carefully inside, sealing it with the golden metal clasp so that it was airtight.

Goro had never seen anything like it before.

He understood well enough how it worked. The water traveled up the siphon into the glass that held the coffee beans. There, the coffee brewed, the ground, bitter dust muddying the water to a thicker consistency and coloring it brown. Finally, the brewed coffee would be sucked out like a vacuum, a pure, ground-free cup brewed to tedious perfection.

He'd never expected that a single cup of coffee could change his life. Who could predict something like that? Cafe Leblanc was in a shit area of Shibuya in an uninspired back alley known more by drunks than residents. And he wasn't ignorant of its owner-- some ex-government worker who retired to waste the rest of his life working in a cafe that had literally one food item on its menu to accompany its more than 40 coffee options-- so, even with the knowledge that the man once managed to demonstrate credibility in intelligence, Goro still couldn't have predicted what a single afternoon would do to him. More than a bad business model, the assumption that Cafe Leblanc would be anything more than disappointing, even as a waste of time, was just irrational.

So, after Goro took his first sip of coffee, after he realized who had made it, after he internalized the meaning of the four walls around him, and after he closed his eyes to the outside world, he had never expected that everything would have become harder after that.

Everything.

Working.

Studying.

Interviewing.

Procrastinating.

Getting up in the morning.

Going to bed at night.

Thinking.

Breathing.

A single cup of coffee communicated to him the careful, kind, genuine sincerity that he'd been missing all of his life.

And so Akechi returned.

Again and again.

And eventually the sincerity and the escapism and the lying and the ulterior motives and the flirtations and the promises and the yearning caught up to him.

And then he died.

 

He'd watched the dust in the air for at least twenty minutes one day while waiting for Akira to come home from school. Sojiro had mentioned cleaning something. He'd disappeared to where Akechi could no longer see him. The sound of water from a faucet could be heard with the occasional sponge on glass. He'd rested his head in his hand, his glove to his left cheek, and he'd stared at the door without seeing it, marveling instead about how moments in life were fleeting like the dust that floated in the light of the sun through the windows of the door or the smile on the face of love that had sprung from his deepest hate. Built on experience after experience, far too many repeated than he would have liked, life wasn't something cherished as sick people on dramas or sad commercials selling insurance said. Life simply continued on and on in a struggle of trial and error, challenges ending in successes or failures. His would be no different. In fact, his would be especially charged by such unending battles. No, they would end just as soon as his own life did.

Probably soon.

Leblanc offered the space to comprehend that his struggle would end soon: a brilliant victory followed by an abrupt end. Once he achieved his life's goal, what was left of life?

Coffee provided escapism.

One couldn't live on coffee alone.

He could remember coming to Cafe Leblanc for the first time months ago. The idea that a cafe could survive on serving only coffee and curry alone had been outrageous, but now, he couldn't imagine himself drinking coffee from anywhere else. He couldn’t imagine obtaining any kind of real substance anywhere else in Tokyo.

 

What had they once shared? Having lived a hundred lives since then, it was difficult to remember the intimacy between them in reality.

 

"You're still working?" Goro’s back was against the wall, his legs spread out along the bed with the single pillow Akira used in his arms. He’d just set his phone down on the window ledge; he’d killed nearly a half hour reviewing the social media pages of the detective prince and catching up on news.

Akira didn’t even look up from his work as he tinkered away at his desk, his back to the bed, "I won't be much longer. I just want to finish this Goho-M before we go in tomorrow."

They were almost done with the casino. All they had to do was reach the manager’s floor to secure the route to the treasure. After that, it would be a short wait until it was November 20th: a short wait until everything ended. Goro, in Akira’s only other set of pajamas, sunk down into the sheets and pulled the comforter over him in a mock pout, "I'm going to sleep." He had grown impatient waiting for Akira to join him in bed.

"Sure, want me to tuck you in, honey?" Akira clearly caught on because he turned around on his stool and grinned, setting the Goho-M on the table before he stood up and began to walk over.

On his back, Goro frowned in his direction, "Do you have to do that?" He meant the pet name. Akira loved using them as frequently as possible, but that usually meant that they were attempts at teasing more-so than affection. Goro decided for himself that pet names were annoying even if his heart felt strained and his cheeks felt warm every time they escaped Akira’s lips.

"No, it's too late." Akira began to press his hands into the comforter around Goro’s body, tucking the blanket as tightly as possible beneath him.

Akechi’s eyes narrowed, "What are you doing?" He did his best to sound annoyed, but his cheeks still hadn’t recovered from the ‘honey’ Akira had used seconds prior.

"Tucking you in." Akira made a show of it, starting around Goro’s shoulders and moving down until there was a perfect outline of him in the comforter all the way down to his feet.

"I don't feel like I can move," Goro complained.

Akira smirked from above him, his eyes bright and alight with mischief, "But sweetie, don't you feel safe?"

"With you around?" Akechi closed his eyes, knowing his cheeks were betraying him.

Akira laughed lightly, clear affection in his voice, "Why don't you act this pleasant around the others?"

'I'm afraid I don't know what you mean," Akechi smirked back.

Akira sat down on the bed, his eyes visible through the transparency of his glasses, "This is the second time you're staying the night."

"I can leave," Akechi offered, knowing full well Akira would ask him to stay. Something about the boy made him even more selfish; something about him made him fish for requests, for praise, for any indication that he was wanted or needed by him.

Akira smiled knowingly, "It makes me happy . . . you being here.” He looked somewhere else, his eyes seeking shelter as though he were shy to confess, “There's nothing better than waking up beside you."

"Your little crush is developing into an obsession.” Akechi knew he should have been more honest. Even in that moment, with death staring back at him in the distance, he should have been candid, but in truth, he didn’t really know how.

He didn’t know what not fighting was like. ‘Peace’ wasn’t a word he was familiar with. If he were genuine in his feelings towards the other boy, that would only be showing weakness, and those were the kinds of things that people used as tools against you. Feelings were the kinds of things people used as tools against you.

So, instead, he left his defenses up; he remained as careful as he could in Akira’s presence.

"I only want to be honest with you."

Those were the last words Akechi wanted to hear.

He rolled his eyes and pulled an arm free to shoo Akira away, "Yes, yes, I get it."

"I care about you." Akira looked back at him, and he didn’t budge.

"Can we not do this?" Akechi snapped, feigning annoyance. No, he did feel annoyed; he had to feel annoyed by Akira’s advances. If he felt anything else, he’d lose.

It didn’t seem to matter whether Akechi was honest or not; Akira’s gray eyes saw everything. "You're sleeping in my bed. My rules. I'm giving you a goodnight kiss."

"You had better not t-"

Akira leaned in and silenced his words with his lips, gentle but affectionate, lingering and soft. The only reason Akechi didn’t pull him down on top of him was because one arm was still carefully tucked in at his side.

Akira pulled away, smile gentle despite the teasing tone, "Treasure stolen."

"We've kissed before," Akechi’s eyes sought refuge anywhere else.

"But that was our first ' _goodnight kiss_ ',” Akira insisted as if it meant something more.

"I had no idea you were so infuriatingly sentimental."

"I could steal something else instead," Akira teased, a hand on Akechi’s thigh suddenly. Over the outline of his legs in the comforter, the hand traveled up slowly, sinking suggestively between his legs.

Akechi jerked away, turning in on his side and red in the face, "Finish your Goho-M!"

“Of course, darling. You’re right. You get some sleep.” Akira, still smiling, walked back over to the desk and continued his work.

 

Akechi could remember that they’d fallen asleep together that night with their hands clasped together. It had been the second time Goro had convinced himself it was just to get closer to him, just to make him easier to manipulate, just to--

Life was appreciated least of all by the living.

 

“Goodnight, my prince.” Only a whisper that left warm breath on his nose.

“ . . . Goodnight, Kurusu.” Only a whisper said with eyes wide open, glad that the other could not see his fear.

“Akira, please.” Only a kiss to his forehead, lingering and soft and heavy with intent.

“ . . . Goodnight, Akira.” Only a surrender.

 

Akechi could smell his hair. No, he couldn't remember what it smelled like anymore. Coffee and Earth? Or had he smelled like that in a dream? Would it be the same smell? He couldn't be sure because nothing felt real anymore. He knew this memory had been real, but his mind felt crowded and clogged from the repetitions of tragedies he had since experienced.

* * *

Bruises and whispers.

On the twenty-second of November, he'd watched Leblanc until it was empty, until the sun had long since set and the OPEN sign had been flipped. Kurusu acted as if he'd known Akechi was waiting, like he knew he'd be the dark silhouette outside the door. The leader of the Phantom Thieves opened the door as soon as their greatest traitor walked up to it, pulling him inside with a hand on his wrist and locking the door closed as soon as they were both inside.

In seconds, Akechi was touching his face apprehensively, eyes wide. He'd left his concealer in the bathroom of Leblanc three days ago and though it was high-end and he'd taught Akira how to use it, he could still make out the discolorations in his skin subtle though they were. Bruising all over his face and down his neck, the evidence of what he'd endured while in captivity screamed across his features, and Akechi was only seeing the visible flesh.

Without a warning, Akechi grabbed his face, thumbs pressing hard against the makeup to smudge the imperfections into visibility. Akira winced, his own hands going immediately to Goro's shoulders as he bit his lip from the pain. Of course he'd endured worse only just 48 hours prior, but pain was not something he had gotten used to, especially the kind that did not come from battle but was inflicted upon him when he was entirely at the mercy of others.

Goro appeared unaffected by Akira's response, eyes only growing wider as he rubbed more makeup away, pinning the other against the bar in the empty cafe with his hips to ensure he would not attempt escape. A hushed whisper broke through his lips as gloveless hands traveled down Akira's neck to reveal more of the abuse, “Everything they did to you . . . I could have . . . I could have saved you. This is my fault.”

Akira finally spoke after letting his arms fall from the other's shoulders and putting them between the eager hands, using them as a means to divide them and force Akechi's arms away. “It had to happen this way.”

Akechi didn't reach for him again, taking a step back as though Akira had told him such intimacies were off-limits to him now. “It didn’t." Hands both hungry and hurt, they made fists at his side as his face contorted into an expression Akira had not seen on Akechi before: shame. "You’re wrong about that, Kurusu.”

“What could you have done?” Akira gambled with the chance that Akechi was enough in his right mind that reasoning would actually work with him. It was the detective's language of choice even if it could be argued that he didn't always seem to operate on actual logic and just appeared to sometimes follow his own concoction of faulty reasoning.

“I could have been honest. I could have worked with you and the others,” the words tumbled out of his mouth, prepared; he'd been considering a number of other alternatives to Akira's death, but he'd shot him anyway. His late-night deliberations had always ended with the same result; he had no choice but to shoot.

Akira shook his head, his words only as harsh as they needed to be to make Akechi see the truth, “And what would you have told Masayoshi Shido?”

“How?” Akechi's whole body snapped to attention, his fists fanning out into desperate fingertips thirsting for the edges of the body in front of him.

“He would have killed you,” Akira's voice was low, his expression soft as his eyes refused to meet Akechi's searching, desperate red irises.

“How can you know? How much do you know!?” And he lunged, his fist flying suddenly to Akira's face, making contact hard enough that Akira fell to floor. Too unexpected, he made no attempt to fight back as Akechi moved to straddle him on the floor of the cafe, eyes wild with despair and misdirected rage. Akira let his arms unravel at his sides, his hands flat with cuffmarks visible. He would not fight Akechi; he knew all too well Akechi didn't actually want to hurt him anyway.

Akira looked sad, tired, maybe even a little disappointed, “This was the only way.”

“What do you know?!” Akechi screamed, his hands going to Akira's neck as his body trembled with rage and his bare instincts clouded the forefront of his mind with aggression.

Kurusu had known and he'd just let him shoot him. He'd known and he'd still risked such an elaborate and risky plan. How dare he?!

“It’s over now," Akira's tone finally went sweet, light and gentle as his eyes softened, "I’m just happy you came back to me.”

“What do you know, Kurusu?!” Akechi punctuated the question with a threat, gripping his neck tighter to pick him up only to slam him back against the hard floor. Akira verbalized the pain in a choking gasp.

And they breathed, eyes clear in transparent faces as they studied one another, daring the other to up the stakes on their game.

When neither of them moved, Akira attempted to speak again, words clear despite the hands on his neck, "That you didn't want to do it. That you never wanted to be the villain. That you love me."

Akechi froze, an itching in his nose a prelude to the water in his eyes that blurred his vision and made it impossible for him to blink. When he let his head fall forward to avoid Akira's eyes, the tears fell anyway, wetting the gray shirt Kurusu was wearing beneath him.

"You really could have died," he managed.

"But I didn't," Akira insisted.

With each tear, the rage dissipated, and Akechi was left shaking with a catharsis that left him naked and exposed. Akira moved slowly, carefully, until he was able to sit up and embrace him, his lips leaving gentle kisses on Akechi's hands first, then his forehead, then his cheeks, catching saltwater in his mouth as Akechi shook uncontrollably.

* * *

When Akira's hand made contact with his face in a loud clap of skin to skin, he couldn’t look back into gray eyes right away and search for a clue as to why. Akechi, instead, only stared at the empty space of the attic room, his face turned in the position that single hand had forced him into. From here, Akechi could see only the window ledge, the darkness outside portraying nothing of what lie beyond the glass.

“I’m sorry,” Akira spoke immediately, his voice cracking pointedly at the end with regret.

Akechi didn't look, didn't move, eyes still wide and staring knowing what his eyes could see but taking in none of it. He hadn't been hit in a very long time, and he had never seen it coming from Akira of all people. Being slapped as a result of emotional frustration was not something Akechi was unfamiliar with, but even still, Kurusu Akira, a spirit never weighed down by things like hatred or paranoia, was something of an exception. So, the physical violence against Akechi surprised the both of them, and for a moment, after Akira's apology, neither moved or spoke.

“I just--" his voice broke again, and it suddenly held a quality Akechi had never heard from him before: strained, fighting to get past his lips, "I can’t bear to hear you say things like that.” Complete despair traced the lines of words and they barely made it to Akechi's ears they were so weighted down with shame.

The voice cause Goro to finally move, looking at the leader of the Phantom Thieves now in pieces and sitting in front of him on his own bed in the attic of Leblanc-- crying. The light from the lamp was on and it glowed around Akira's trembling form while the overhead light was off leaving the rest of the attic and most of Leblanc in darkness. Akechi wondered how terrible of a person you had to be to make Kurusu Akira hit you. Akechi silently reminded himself that he was his father's son, so with that blood tie, most anything in that regard was possible.

Though the light from the desk lamp fell on Akechi's face and only cast Akira in shadow, he was sure of what he saw; the other boy cried as he watched him, his hands fidgeting in the sheets as they hid with shame for what they'd done.

For a long moment, Akechi said nothing and simply watched Akira cry. Despite having the floor to speak, he couldn't think of what the proper thing to say was. Speaking itself never proved to be a particularly smart option following physical abuse anyway.

“Goro, you can’t say that. . . . Your life means nothing? You have no worth? No value? I can’t . . . I can’t listen to you say those things," Akira moved, reaching out to embrace him, but Akechi impulsively moved back, away from him, up against the wall behind him. He didn't fear Akira, but he did fear everything else: why Akira hit him, why Akira cried, and why he cared that Akira was crying.

“But they’re true,” he heard himself say the words, and he wondered if it was okay to really be so honest in a time like this. Akira clearly felt guilty over what he'd done, and while Akechi didn't think the behavior was acceptable, he didn't think that it was wrong for Akira to hit him, either. Sure, the logic was contradictory, but Akechi had grown up with it.

Hitting was wrong unless you were a person who deserved it.

He was cursed, so of course he deserved it.

So, now, just like all the other times, someone had hit him as an emotional response to something he'd said or did. They never would have been violent if it wasn't for him.

It was his fault he was hit, and he probably deserved more than just the single slap. No, he knew he did, especially from Akira whom he had wronged in so many ways.

“They’re not-They’re not true! I don’t know who has been telling you, but they’re not true. I value you. Can’t you see that? I need you.” From the new distance, the shadows appeared deeper on Akira's face.

Goro shook his head. He sat against the attic wall quite convinced that Akira was thinking about the way they were before he'd tried to take his life, but Akechi knew, and Akira had to know as well, that everything leading up to that had been fake, a ruse Akechi had put on just to be close to Akira, just to gain his trust so that it would be that much easier to manipulate him. “That was all a lie," Goro insisted softly, "I tricked you. None of that was real.”

Akira finally managed to take find and take Akechi's hands, and Goro didn't pull away. “No, you’re wrong. It was perhaps the most real that you-- Goro, you have to believe me. You have a place with me. Please.”

"Until you're done with me," Goro smiled, sheepish. His words had tumbled forth without his permission, and now that they had, he felt rather childish for saying them. Akira unraveled him. Akira stripped him bare.

Leaving Akechi no escape, Akira shook his head and moved closer to him until Akechi was nearly pinned against the wall, but instead of pushing him against it, Akira pulled the boy closer to himself in a desperate and sudden embrace. He spoke, "No, Goro. No, I'm never going to be done with you. That's not how it works. That's not how we work. I love you. Don't you understand what that means?"

"That you feel that way now . . ." Akechi tried to relax, his chin on Akira's shoulder. Everyone changed their mind eventually and it really was for the best. Ultimately, it was always for the best that he be left alone.

"And I'll keep feeling that way. I'll never stop," his arms tightened around Akechi's waist,

"I believe . . . that you have convinced yourself of such a truth," Akechi conceded only so much.

"It's true." Akira pulled out of the embrace only to separate I promise."

"You're sixteen, practically a child. You don't really know what you want. You can't predict what you will want next year much less twenty years from now."

"Goro." Gray eyes had calmed, but they still conveyed a thousand emotions that Goro couldn’t name.

"Like I said, yes, it's clear you think that way now, but people change," he reiterated. "Anyway, for what it’s worth, I won't hold it against you when you do."

Akira realized there was nothing he could say; the conversation wasn't actually about him at all.

* * *

The mirror never reflected the right image. Sometimes he’s fifteen. Sometimes he’s ten. Sometimes he’s six with his mother’s blood on his hands. Sometimes he’s himself.

He’d gone to the bathhouse across the street from Leblanc once on a Monday. Akira had joined him; there couldn’t have been a way for him to know he’d be there. He’d never been so distracted in the bath in his life. At one point, the water had turned a red color and the smell of iron had hung in the air. Akira had looked at him and asked him to stop the bleeding. He’d told him he would if he could.

At one point, he’d gone with the thieves to a shitty diner in Shibuya. Laughing came more easily in a group. A smile stuck to his face with minimal effort on his part when he was surrounded by others. The most charming of robots, he’d laughed when necessary, smiled when not, and contributed to the conversation when space was left for him to do so. And even if he’d wanted to, he couldn’t stop. The conversation took a more serious turn, and he smiled. They brought up Okumura’s death, and he laughed. Having no control left him in shreds of who he had been only an hour prior, but no one would know because his eyes were still sparkling and his teeth were still white.

One time, on the way home, he’d seen it following him. Just out of the corner of his eye, a dark shadow had appeared. He turned only only once to look behind him and see nothing. He knew better than to try again.

At one point, he’d been stranded in the ocean, water in every direction and no land in site. The water cold, his detective coat weighed him down as he picked a direction and swam. At least he hadn’t been alone; the moon sang of his impending death as his body exhausted itself into drowning.

In the darkness, he searched for familiarity, and when something stirred inside himself, he called Loki, shock shattering his past hundred lives when he appeared all wild malice in red flames. All this time, he'd thought he'd been alone. All this time, he'd thought escape had been impossible. Did it mean that what Akira said was true? Was he alive? His body still existed somewhere?

"Loki?" a voice called. His own voice? "Robin Hood!"

A golden aura surrounded the proud persona, shining light on a princely form dressed in white.

Goro stared through the screen of his helmet at Crow, and, processing what would likely happen next a second sooner than his doppelganger, he attacked, a claw tearing straight through flesh before a saber or a beam could come his way.

"How? Is this really how I die?" his doppelganger asked, Robin Hood and Loki crowding around the two of them, more curious than anything else.

"It's fitting, isn't it?" he asked.

Crow's eyes went blank, his breath still. The Black Mask walked away.

On the floor of the attic, he grew feathers. Black feathers. Small at first, slow and easy to hide, but in Akira's absence, they got worse, multiplied, grew longer. His arms, his legs, his stomach, his neck, his face. He tried to cut them off. He tried to pull them out. Bloodied feathers littered the attic floor only to be replaced in seconds, protruding through his skin as natural as the hair on his head.

Feathers, black feathers.

A crow.

Where was Akira?

His bones grew and shifted and snapped and broke. His body contorted and the bloodied black feathers spread.

Screaming. All he could manage now was screaming.

A bird, nearby, loud and pained, cawed alone with a call that echoed down empty, forgotten alleyways where only trash lived and vice bred.

He screamed again and realized it was only him.

Writhing, he reached at the edges of his humanity to find nothing there but black wings and opalescent feathers, a sharp beak and a beady eye.

If he could fly, then he could escape. He could meet his end at nearly a hundred kilometers per hour on the side of a concrete building-- abrupt and self-inflicted. He’d feel less pain than his mother did.

Breathless.

Orgasm or suffocation?

Living or dying?

Akira was holding him again on the decrepit floor of the attic. He tried to scream, but his mouth was gone, skin smoothed over and tight in its place. He watched as Akira's scared, yellow eyes watered. Stunned, he did nothing but hold the thing Akechi had become. Maybe he thought that was all he could do.

* * *

At the casino, Crow couldn't see Joker's face. It was smooth and blank, no domino mask or endless, gray eyes, no tempting lips, or pearl white teeth. No one else seemed to notice.

At the casino, he tries again.

“It will work. Just as you planned, you will escape with your life. I promise," he hated looking at Joker because there was nothing to see but flat, featureless flesh.

“What are you saying, Crow?” Futaba asked, still unaffected by Joker's condition. Like the others, she didn't seem to care that he'd been replaced with a nightmare.

“Joker--no, Kurusu," holding back a grimace, he reached for red gloves, “Akira, please trust me.”

“What?” a mouth and chin appeared, but they weren't right. The proportion was off from the rest of the face. Still, no one was commenting; they all stared at Akechi instead as if he were the anomaly.

Akechi sweat, certain the image would haunt his memory. Hoping to make more progress, he pulled his own red mask away letting it clatter to the roulette wheel below, “Please trust me, Akira. I know you don’t. I know you don’t, and I’m asking too much, but you have to. You have to trust me. Your plan will work. You’re going to be okay. Follow through with what you planned with your friends. And afterwards, . . . change Shido’s heart for me, okay?”

“Akechi?” a nose and a domino mask that concealed flat, pale flesh behind it appeared next. The mouth on what should have been Joker found its rightful position.

“Crow, what’s going on?” Panther stepped forward, cautious.

“I’m going to die.”

“Crow, what are you talking about?” Queen snapped, eyes wide in her mask.

Ignored, Akechi finally found the gray he wished he could die inside, and he smiled when Joker finally returned to him. “But, I was genuinely happy with you.”

“Akechi?” Joker asked, cautious and concern on his lips.

Goro leaned in to kiss them away, opening Joker's mouth with his tongue to take him long and deep but sweet, “Thank you." He pulled away, noticing the shock in his captor's expressive, gray eyes, "I’m sorry I couldn’t be more honest with you. I’m sorry I couldn’t be . . yours. He’s right. I’m a puppet. There really is no other way. When the time comes, let me die, okay?”

“Akechi, stop!” Haru yelled, her expression pained as though her level of understanding far surpassed that of the others.

“My revenge wasn’t wrong," he told Joker, "My desire to destroy him wasn’t wrong, but-- everything else . . . Everything else was a mistake. I’m sorry I hurt you, but I’m really not worth feeling pain over, alright?”

“Goro?"

“You have to go, and so do I. For what it’s worth, I think you were the closest thing to ‘love’ I ever knew, so, thank you.”

“Goro!” Joker reached out to empty air.

“Joker, the ambush!”

“Joker, I’m not picking up Crow’s signal any longer.”

“Joker, he said that our plan would work. That means he knows. What should we do?”

“Trust him.”

* * *

When he wakes up on the floor of the attic again, he’s naked, and, in patches, flaking mold grows on his breathless corpse. Disgusted, he tries to brush it off, but it keeps growing, bubbling up from festering wounds left unattended. He stares at the thousands of tiny holes covering his skin until they look like domino masks folded in and on top of one another. White growth of a stranger, separate organism crawls up his arm, consuming flesh and converting it into itself. When he lifts his hand to his face, the molded limb falls in a splatter to the wooden floorboards below, the thousands of tiny domino masks covering his stumped arm in a colony of bad memories. Death made way for so much life. Too weak to sit up, he falls backward to the floor and realizes his other arm is limp, captured too by the tiny white masks with little holes that are now bubbling and building up and around his face, into his mouth and over his eyes. He can feel the soft, airy texture on his tongue moments before he loses consciousness altogether.

* * *

 

He woke again, sick with a fever and a crawling in his skin. Spiraled horns in horizontal, black and white stripes slowly, painfully, began to protrude from just beneath the surface of his skin, bleeding red as they grew longer, thin and sharp and inhuman. Creating holes in his body, the horns would fall from his body after reaching several centimeters long. Certain he’d bleed to death on the attic floor, he waited for it to come, unable to move from the pain the illness manifested in his bones. Bloody, silent, and slow, death whispered of a freedom he’d never quite obtain.

That was how each of them found him.

 

“Hey, Chi-chan, what are you going to accomplish down there?” Ann spoke from her seated position on the couch dressed in her Shujin uniform, her pigtails cascading over her shoulders and her legs crossed. She was smiling, and if she found Akechi’s state disgusting or horrifying or alarming in any way, she didn’t show it on her face.

Akechi couldn’t move, but he could speak, and so he did, “Ann-chan, did you enjoy that little nightmare?”

“I think we could really be friends. If you weren’t so fake all the time maybe.” She was still smiling, and so that was his first clue.

“And if only I would stop murdering people,” he attempted to smile back, surprising himself that even in this much pain, he could.

“Oh, well, that too,” she laughed in the way that TV sitcoms did, and he was certain it was on playback, recorded from some prior circumstance since it didn't quite fit the atmosphere at hand.

“It’s strange. The feelings from that dream still linger,” he offered an opening.

“Developing a crush?” but she didn't take it.

“So, I’m gay.”

“Clearly. Jeeze, joking!" she threw up here hands, a pout on her face ready to complain that he was 'no fun'. "Anyway, what would you like to talk about?”

“Nothing,” he replied, unwilling to play this game.

“But that’s why I’m here. I’m here to talk.”

“I have nothing to say.”

“That’s a first.”

Was it? Yeah, maybe it was.

“You gave me too much credit back then,” he tried, vague on purpose. He knew that he would understand.

“I mean, not really,” she leaned forward, elbow on her her and head in her hand.

“You’re too kind.” Ann, he meant.

She smiled, blushing, “Jeeze, I was just being honest. Your situation was really messed up. And I already knew about you and Akira, or at least, that something was going on." she struggled to find her words a second, "Hmm, that Akira cared. I could see it. It was more for him than for you.”

“I see," he could believe that.

“Yeah, but it didn’t really matter in the end did it?” she asked, eyes thoughtful.

“No, it did,” he winced. Another twisted horn fell from his skin, this time from the palm of his right hand. That made four holes, about two centimeters in diameter each, just gaping open in his skin to bleed out on the floor.

“Did it?” she asked.

He stared at the hole in his hand, holding his palm in front of his face. “Maybe not.”

“Yeah, your pride got in the way anyway. You still died.”

He didn't answer. Was that really what he thought? Was that the truth then?

“So why are you still here?” she stood up. She looked ready to leave, herself.

“Someone wants me here?” he sounded unsure.

“Lucky you!” She smiled with her eyes.

“I suppose.” He did not.

 

“You and Akira are having trouble, I see? Sae mentioned you seem pretty tired lately on the few occasions she has seen you. Is there . . . anything I can do to help? I know it’s not really my business but— well, if you need to talk to someone, I could listen.” Makoto, also in her Shujin uniform, had joined him now. She sat in the desk chair, turning it towards his bloodied body on the floor.

“I don’t need to talk,” he dismissed her. Makoto had turned out to be . . . a lot more like her sister than he'd thought, and he'd ended up with a respect for her he hadn't seen coming.

“Hmm, well, is there something else you might need?” she crossed her arms and sat straight. Using all of the formalities of a student body president, she waited patiently for him to explain his problems.

“You can’t-- nevermind. No, no, Nijima, I don’t need anything else.” If his assumptions were correct, much more effort would be required on his part to escape this.

“It’s Makoto.”

He wanted this to be over. The horn protruding from his shin had been the widest yet, and it left him biting his lip to keep from screaming or worse, crying.

“What’s it like?” she blinked, thoughtful.

“Hmm?”

“Dating Akira?” she looked to her left in the direction of the bed, blushed, and looked to her right instead, apparently finding nothing about the desk embarrassing.

“We’re not dating."

“Oh.”

“It seemed that way?”

“Yeah, I mean, it was pretty obvious how he felt about you. Even though he doesn’t talk much, he clearly chose his words carefully when you were the topic of discussion.” She dared a look in his direction, and when their eyes met, she held them.

“Oh.” Was this a confession?

“Honestly, it forced all of us to consider you from his perspective. We talked about it a few times . . . when he wasn’t around, of course, which, looking back, was probably when you were with him.”

“I’m not interested in your gossip.” He had a clear picture of what the Thieves thought of him; he didn't want him distorting that as well. He'd already lost faith in his own perception of reality, in his own history, even, despite it being a memory far more clear than the others.

Makoto went on, “Obviously, we really trust him, not just as our leader, but as our friend, and so we tried to see your good qualities. We tried to understand what about you he cared about. After all, he found something in each of us that he cared about, so if he were able to see something in you, then we thought that perhaps we were overlooking something.”

“And, what incredible epiphany did you lot happen upon?”

“We didn’t, really,” Makoto replied apologetically. When he didn't reply except to gasp in pain as the horn clattered to the floor, she went on, “We couldn’t decide on what was good about you except that maybe you were like us-- wronged by adults and unable to escape the situation on your own.”

“I see,” he felt the next one pierce the skin in his back, this one shifting and growing exceptionally slow.

“We thought maybe you were just a worst-case scenario and maybe Akira felt sorry for you.”

“I see." With the intent to cut the skin around the horn himself and thus make it easier to come out, Goro grabbed for one of the horns that had already fallen out, but when reached for it and his hand closed around it, it went flat and limp like a Dali painting. He dropped it, surprised and terrified, and it took its shape once more. He didn't try again.

“He just pitied you more than the rest of us, so because he felt like you needed him the most, he risked the most on your behalf.”

“Right . . .”

“You agree?” he looked disappointed, but Goro had already caught on, so he didn't call him out on it.

“Sure," he tried smiling again, his hair damp with sweat and pooling on the floor, "What else could it be? It’s not as if there is anything about myself that is worth loving. I am cursed, after all.”

“See, that’s what we thought.”

Makoto wouldn’t say that, but he wasn’t speaking to Makoto at all, was he?

 

“Man, I just don’t get you. Like, I get why you feel the way you do but your whole complicated revenge plot just doesn’t make any sense to me.” He was sitting on the desk, his feet, in socks, in the seat of the chair. Akechi had never seen him sit like that, but he didn't know him as well.

“No surprise there.” Akechi replied, tired. He should have expected this; it wasn't going to stop until he'd spoken to all of them.

“Dude, I’m not gonna play your stupid game, okay. I’m just here for my best friend.” So earnest.

“How admirable.” Akechi actually meant that, but he had used the same tone he always did, so he was sure that Sakamoto wouldn't see it that way.

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

“Did you come here with any sort of purpose?” Akechi tried.

“Akira deserves better, but I guess it doesn’t matter? You’re what he wants. So like, you should become a better person.”

“Excuse me?” A better person? What did that even mean? Akechi couldn't help but feel judgmental even as the horn in his back twisted out slowly, surely several more centimeters long than the one from his shin.

“You should be someone he deserves. You should, like, ugh, I dunno, live up to his expectations.” It was easy for Sakamoto to be honest; it seemed impossible for him to articulate himself at the same time.

“I’m afraid that’s impossible; in case you’ve forgotten—dead,” Akechi pointed to himself. Ann had confirmed it earlier, so he didn't know why he was choosing Ryuji to say otherwise.

“Ugh, that’s just an excuse. I mean, he’s with you here right? Can’t you try? Like, can’t you try at all to be what he sees in you? For him?”

Akechi blinked. “I never expected something like this out of you.”

“I’m smarter than assholes like you give me credit for,” he smiled.

It made Goro feel a little sad, but only a little. The pain crawling all over his skin was a far more prominent emotion at the moment. “I never said you were smart.”

“You’re such an asshole.”

“Better asshole than idiot.”

“Whatever. Take the last word since it’s so damn important to you. Just, try harder to be better for Akira.” Without another word, he walked up to Akechi, put his left hand on his shoulder, and reached with his right to pull the horn out of his back with a jerk.

Akechi screamed, howling from the tremors as a part of himself had been torn away. He could hear the clatter as it hit the floor and felt the warm liquid on his back. He didn't think he heard anything else before he found himself alone.

 

“You were never good for him but he couldn’t give up on you. You owe him a lot you know?” Morgana sat in the chair, but not as a cat would sit. Like a person with arms and legs, his tail flicking behind him, annoyed, Morgana spoke to him from a position of power that Akechi never thought he'd be met with in the form of a housecat.

“Is it because you’re a cat that I feel like I can tell you anything?”

“I’m not a cat!” Morgana hissed and jumped up suddenly, his body tense, weighted on hind legs ready to pounce.

“Right, right.”

“I’ve seen you with him more than anyone else has. You— he— he Is happy with you.” He didn't want to hear that from the cat's mouth.

Goro's patience finished with those words. If he were really being made to endure this pain throughout the entirety of this nightmare, he would in no way make it through all eight thieves. “Sucks to be him.”

“Like I just said, I’ve seen the two of you together. You care about him. Let yourself care." The cat sounded too angry to mean it.

He'd never realized Kurusu could act so incredibly cowardly.

“I’m opting out of this therapy session between myself and a cat.”

“Your defense mechanisms are just getting annoying. I’m not going to waste time on someone who doesn’t operate on common sense!”

“Am I to infer from that that Akira does?” Goro winced. Two horns were protruding at once- one from the top of his right foot and the other from left side of his head, just above his ear.

“He at least listens to reason!”

“I’m reasonable,” Goro's tone in no way matched the state of his body, let alone his mind, but it was frighteningly convincing nonetheless.

“When it’s to your advantage or when you’re in control. You can’t seem to let go.”

“Well of course not." Exhibit A: The current state of things.

“So, that’s why you’re impossible. Having relationships with others means you’ll have to compromise with others.”

“No, thank you.”

“Exactly. That’s why things didn’t work out. If you had been more honest and if you had let him help, you wouldn’t be dead right now.”

“The lecture is late.” The cat said nothing, so Goro tried again, "Too little, too late." And, instead of walking away as the others had, Morgana vanished, literally disappearing in front of his eyes and leaving Akechi alone with twisted black and white and red everywhere.

 

“What happened to your light?” Kitagawa Yusuke sat on the couch, his index fingers and thumbs forming a makeshift frame that he squinted through to see Goro’s form on the floor. Decorated in bloody wounds of perfect symmetry and surrounded by twisted horns, he resembled something more demon than human. A horror only possible within the limits of one's imagination; he opened red eyes to see the blue haired artist observing him curiously.

Akechi didn’t know what he was talking about, and Yusuke was usually nonsense and art references, so he didn’t respond.

“What do you like?” he put his hands down so that long fingers could curl around the seat of of the couch and he could lean forward as if to further sate his curiosity.

“I don’t know,” he shuddered, aware that his skin, too full of holes to hold shape, no longer contained him.

“Hm?”

He closed his eyes. “I thought I did. . . I thought I liked . . . Being liked. And being a detective—solving mysteries and puzzles. Reading. Learning. Attention. I don’t—“

Now he likes peace, the absence of fear, his memories of being alive and beside Akira. He missed being alive to be with them--no him. He couldn’t go back now. He’d been so stupid.

“What do you want?” Yusuke scooted further to the edge of the couch, but Akechi didn't see.

“—want anything. I don’t want anything anymore. Not to be noticed. Not solving crimes for justice or mysteries or anything. I hate learning. I don’t want to ever open up another textbook. I don’t want to be liked—not like how it has been. I don’t even know what I might like. I don’t like anything. I don’t want anything.”

“Well then what are you living for?” Yusuke, all arms and legs, moved as a spider down to the floor.

Akechi's eyes remained closed. He was too scared to open them. What if he did and he no longer recognized himself anymore? “I don’t know. I’m not sure I’ve ever done that before. I’ve survived. I’m very good at that.”

“Who are you living for?” the voice felt closer, still curious, but pressing now. It cushioned his body in attempts to form him back into the shape he'd once been.

“I survived for Shido. For my mother and for myself. For my revenge. So it would be more correct to ask ‘what’ I was living for. But now the revenge is over.”

“Now what?”

He felt flesh that wasn't his own, but he couldn't identify what or where it had touched, so he kept his eyes closed.

“Now I suppose I suffer for my crimes.”

“And you’re satisfied with that?” Akira clearly wasn't.

“I’m sure it would satisfy someone else. The families of the people I murdered? The people I injured? The Phantom Thieves, too? I’ll survive my punishment and then I will just continue . . . to survive?” The flesh curled around him, wrapping him back into something whole around and around and around his body. Yusuke had been built all limps and length but the sensation was too encompassing to be human.

“That’s it?”

“I have nothing else.”

“You have Akira,” he reminded him.

“Not really," Akechi dismissed, pulling his eyes tight for fear he'd accidentally blink them open, "He will come to his senses eventually or he’ll face the consequences.”

“The consequences?” A breath on his ear whispered the question as a spell.

“I want to say ‘I can’t even go back’, but that’s wrong. All of you knew. Even back then, Akira knew. I don’t deserve him or peace or anything really. . . . Tell me, Kurusu Akira, what you want of me.”

The sensation disappeared and the pain returned in an instant. His eyes blinked open to see Yusuke sitting on the couch, staring blankly at him neither denying or confirming his speculations.

“I give up. You win.”

 

Reflecting back on everything, it felt obvious to Akechi now that Akira knew everything from the beginning. He knew that they’d fall in love and that Akechi would betray that love. He knew that even if they found each other again, they’d end up once more in tragedy; they were destined for it.

But, even still, Akechi just wanted Akira back. No matter how many times he was going to suffer for what he’d done and no matter how many times Akira was going to try again, he still wanted Akira back.

So when he arrived last and walked straight over to Goro, crouching beside him a minute only to check his breath and pulse before he sat down and gathered him up in his arms like a dying man, Akechi didn’t voice a single complaint.

Instead, he told him the truth.

Finally.

“I’ve lost my mind,” Akechi whispered, watching as something long and sharp broke the skin on his other hand from somewhere inside him. Red and wet with blood, it cut what it could and pushed through until it fell to the floor in a bloody mess, leaving yet another bloody hole in his skin. Another horn about the size of a baton joined the pile that scattered around him.

“That’s not true,” he heard Akira whisper before feeling something wet dripping on his forehead.

Akechi let his unsupported head fall back so that he could see Akira’s expression, but Akira’s face was missing. Instead, there was only emptiness, unnaturally smooth and bloodied-- no depth for the mouth or nose, no eyes in the empty sockets, no mouth or tongue or even jaw: just bloodied tissue as if someone had carved through his head to remove his face and instead of the caverns and bone, there was only a bloody mass beneath the mask. Goro couldn’t look away from it because he could still remember how beautiful Kurusu once was.

“If I never believed in myself, and I left the world believing in you, what am I supposed to believe in now that I know you’re no different from me?”

“Are you sure that you never believed in yourself?” The face only dripped blood but otherwise, the empty space did not move. The voice came from what was left of Akira, but the words were never spoken.

“I’m not sure of anything anymore,” Goro admitted, still staring, never looking away, never blinking.

“It will be okay.”

Akira held him, blood falling freely and dripping down his chin and neck while some of it fell directly onto Goro’s face. At some point, Goro had begun to laugh. At some point, Goro had begun to cry. At some point, he wasn’t sure what the difference was.

“I want to believe I’m alive, but beyond that, I don’t know what I am.”

The creature that held him close said nothing, so Goro clarified.

“And neither do you, do you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY!  
> Hopefully, there were enough clues this chapter to help you make sense of everything that has happened thus far!  
>   
> I'd love to hear your thouuuughts~! Thank you for waiiiitttiiiing~
> 
> Note: Haru and Futaba are left out of this chapter on purpose. I wrote both of them, but I took them out because I realized that it didn't make sense for a certain someone. So, yeah, that was on purpose. :D

**Author's Note:**

> Any comments, thoughts, requests, ideas, etc, would be much appreciated~ Thank you for reading~!


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